Apple bounces back in India, clocks double-digit growth

New Delhi, July 31 (IANS) India is back on Apple's global map, with CEO Tim Cook announcing that the growth in the country bounced back in the company's fiscal 2019 third quarter that saw record results.

In an earnings call with analysts late Tuesday, Cook said that tactically, the emerging markets had a bit of a rebound in the third quarter that saw Apple Services vertical grow further.

"In fact, on a constant currency basis, we actually grew slightly in emerging markets. We still declined on a reported basis. India bounced back. During the quarter, we returned to growth there. We are very happy with that. We grew in Brazil as well," said Apple CEO.

The return of Apple in India - including 19 per cent iPhone shipments growth (YoY) in Q3 -- comes at a time when the company is reportedly set to manufacture top-end iPhone XS and iPhone XR courtesy its supplier Foxconn in the country.

"Price cuts and aggressive marketing has helped Apple to drive revenues in India," Tarun Pathak, Associate Director at Counterpoint Research, told IANS.

Giving an impetus to its India manufacturing plans, Apple in April started the assembling of iPhone 7 at its supplier Wistron's facility in Bengaluru.

According to Luca Maestri, Apple's CFO, the company set June quarter revenue records in several major developed markets.

"In emerging markets, we returned to growth in Mainland China, grew strong double digits in India and Brazil and we set new Q3 records in Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines," informed Maestri.

Apple is slowly but steadily strategising its plans to make deeper inroads in a country where over 450 million people use smartphones, and assembling iPhone 7 is another step towards gaining more ground.

Reiterating that India is an important market for Apple, Cook earlier said the current iPhone manufacturing will see maximum growth in days to come amid the renewed push to open its branded retail stores in the country.

Cook told analysts during the company's Q2 results on April 30 that the company has made some "adjustments in India and have seen preliminary some better results there".

"India is a very important market in the long-term. It is a challenging market in the short-term. But we are learning a lot."

"We have started manufacturing there which is very important to be able to serve the market in a reasonable way. And we are growing that capability there," said the Apple CEO.

Cook also emphasized on the company's plans to open its branded stores in India.

"We would like to place retail stores there. And we are working with the government to seek approval to do that. And so, we plan on going in there with sort of all of our might," said Cook.