Optiemus will be making the company’s upcoming Bluetooth neckband earphones at its Noida facility. The electronics manufacturer, which also makes for Noise, Ambrane, and other brands, has dedicated a single assembly line with a capacity of 40,000 units per day, employing 70 people.
“This partnership with Optiemus Electronics marks a major milestone in our efforts to accelerate our localisation of products and components to bring out high-quality devices that will be Made in India at honest pricing,” said Xiaomi India president, Muralikrishnan B said.
“We are committed to forging more such collaborations for a wider range of categories, across our product lineup,” he added.
Optiemus Electronics will be making the printed circuit board assemblies (PCBAs) for the earphones, as well as do the final assembly and testing.
“We are happy to partner with Xiaomi India and contribute to their vision of localisation… This partnership is a significant testimony to Optiemus Electronics’ expertise and growing capabilities,” said Nitesh Gupta, director, Optiemus Electronics.
The two companies did not specify the value of the deal.“We will start small with the low hanging fruit. The PCB is something that we will do, and then one after another, we will start localising,” Muralikrishnan said.
The company has been making its phones in India since 2015 at the facilities of DBG, BYD, Flex, Bharat FIH and smart TVs with Radiant and Dixon Technologies since 2018. In the course of time, Xiaomi India has localised sourcing of various components such as the PCBAs, chargers, cables and the likes, which comes up to around 35% of the value of the devices, excluding the semiconductor components.
Xiaomi India is now targeting a 50% increase in domestic value addition in smartphones over the next two years.
“This year we are kicking off two projects. One is on the display and the second is on the fingerprint sensor. We will have something more meaningful to announce on that front later this year. In fact, by the end of the year, the domestic value addition will probably touch closer to 20% including the semiconductor components,” Muralikrishnan said.
In the course of the next couple of years, Muralikrishnan said, Xiaomi will start sourcing the bare PCB boards, as well as other mechanical parts and the vibrator module.
The development comes amidst testing times for Xiaomi India, which fell to the fourth spot in the smartphone shipment rankings in Q1 2023 after leading the market for 20 straight quarters.
