Sony Ericsson goes native in India

IN YET another acknowledgement of India's growing importance in the cellular world, Sony Ericsson has announced it's going local and plans to start making mobile phones in Chennai.

Significantly these plans will be realised through agreements with its existing outsourced manufacturing partners - Flextronics and Foxconn.

Initially the idea is to produce handsets for local distribution - such as basic colour phones as well as mid-range music enabled phones. They'll also sport customised keypads and come pre-loaded with local content.

However, manufacturing in India is part of Sony Ericsson plans to bolster its position globally. The company expects its annual production capacity in India will reach 10 million units by 2009.

Significantly, in a market which already has 105.4 million GSM subscribers, Sony Ericsson is claiming it is the Number Three supplier of such phones to the Indian market.

With BenQ Siemens effectively now out of the way, Sony Ericsson needs to catch the likes of LG and Samsung if it is to take the No: 3 slot globally. Success in emerging markets was named by arch rival Nokia as one good reason why it is holding onto its No: 1 slot. µ