Nokia to set up handset plant near Chennai

The Hindu : Business: "The mobile handset major, Nokia, today announced that Sriperumbedur, about 40 km west of Chennai, would host its first manufacturing facility for phones in the country and the tenth across continents. The plant, on which the company expects to invest between $100 and $150 million, will be its fourth such facility in the Asia Pacific region. After participating in the signing of a memorandum of understanding with Nokia, the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, told the State Assembly today that the plant would come up at the industrial estate of the State Industries Promotion Corporation of Tamil Nadu (SIPCOT).

Nokia, she added, planned to initially invest Rs. 675 crores ($150 million), while its component suppliers would make a similar investment. About 1,200 direct jobs and 6,000 indirect employment opportunities would be generated thanks to the investment. The area housing the plant, to initially produce 24 million handsets, and the allied units would be declared as a Special Economic Zone, Ms. Jayalalithaa said. The plant would go on stream in the first half of 2006 and employ 2,000 people on attaining full scale production.

Apart from meeting the growing demand for mobile phones in the country — both the GSM (Global System for Mobiles) and CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) varieties — the handsets manufactured at the plant were also likely to be exported. According to Raimo Puntala, Senior Vice-President (Operations and Logistics, Customer and Market Operations) of Nokia Corporation, the Sriperumbedur plant promised "clear logistics advantage," to the company."