Apple chief maps his vision for India

New Delhi / Bloomberg

Apple Inc.’s Tim Cook outlined his vision for his company in India in a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday where they also discussed cybersecurity and data encryption.
“Cook shared Apple Inc.’s future plans for India,” according to a statement from the Indian government. “He spoke of the possibilities of manufacturing and retailing in India.”
The Apple chief executive officer on his first trip to India opened a development center, dined with Indian celebrities and met corporate executives. Cook’s four-day visit comes as Modi’s administration reviews Apple’s application to open retail stores in the world’s second-largest mobile population.
Modi in a Twitter post thanked Cook after the Apple executive launched an updated version of a mobile application named after the premier. Cook in return thanked Modi for a “ great meeting.” “Already looking forward to next visit to India,” he wrote on his Twitter account.
Renewable Energy
The men also discussed Modi’s initiatives for renewable energy, according to the statement.
Cook has left India and visited an Apple store in Dubai, according to pictures posted on his Twitter feed.
An Indian telecommunications ministry official said on May 3 that the country had rejected Apple’s request to import and sell refurbished iPhones to Asia’s
third-largest economy. India is a market where most phones are bought outright and aren’t subsidized by carriers through calling plans.
The challenge for Apple is that its products are beyond the reach of many in India, where most people live on less than $3.10 a day, according to World Bank data.
As China’s market becomes more saturated and people across the globe upgrade their smartphones less frequently, Apple, Samsung Electronics Co. and other vendors are keen to sell to India’s middle class, which is projected to quadruple to 200 million by 2020.