Tim Cook to meet with major Indian Carriers to forge ‘strategic partnerships’ for LTE rollout

SAN FRANCISCO (Diya TV) — Apple CEO Tim Cook is preparing his team for discussions with the world’s top telecom providers to begin developing partnerships for the sales and distribution of devices throughout India, a market the company has recently amped up efforts to crack.

Apple’s top brass view the South Asian nation’s widening 4G network as the vehicle that will not only boost sales of its popular iPhone, but also that of its other products, such as the iPad and Apple TV.

Cook said the advent of high-speed 4G internet networks in the country will expand the market for greater iPhone exposure, and has on multiple occasions in recent months pinpointed India as a key market for Apple. Bharti Airtel, India’s largest mobile provider, and Reliance Jio Infocomm, are preparing to introduce nationwide commercial 4G networks to the country later this year.

Apple and Bharti Airtel have already begun strategy discussions on how best to approach the situation on a broader level, according to a senior executive in a report from the Economic Times. The talks have included distribution options, the development of a retail chain and the training of sales personnel, according to the report.

Bharti Airtel chairman Sunil Mittal will meet with Cook on Friday. Cook has additional plans to meet with Tata Group chairman Cyrus Mistry and consultancy services CEO N Chandrasekaran and Vodafone India CEO Sunil Sood. He is also likely to sit for meetings with Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao and Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis.

A senior executive of Reliance Retail, a company which already has an established distribution network for 4G handsets, said that while the bundling of Apple products was an option, the two company’s could possibly discuss the idea of using Reliance’s network as a vehicle to expand into untapped networks. Newer markets could be targeted as part of Reliance’s rollout of its Jio 4G services.

“The distribution network will purely focus on 4G devices to push adoption of 4G services, which is of interest to Apple since currently it reaches around 10,000-odd outlets and it wants to make deeper inroads in India along with the services,” the executive said, according to the Times report.

Cook has said he believes sales of Apple’s iPhone will improve significantly once the 4G networks gain traction across the nation. Smartphone sales in India have been stagnant and have been flooded with mostly “low-end” models because of the existing networks, he said.

“The thing that (has) held not only us back, perhaps but some others as well, is that the LTE rollout in India just really began this year, and so we’ll begin to see some really good networks coming on in India,” Cook had said during a conference call last month.

“That will unleash the power and capability of the iPhone in a way that an older network, a 2.5G, or even some 3G networks, would not do,” he added.

Apple currently possesses just three percent of the volume share of India’s smartphone market, which translates to an overall value of 11 percent. However, in the premium segment or handsets priced over Rs 30,000, both Samsung and Apple are neck and neck, together accounting for more than 95% of the segment.

During his trip to Mumbai, Cook is also expected to discuss the idea of developing iOS applications in India, and the potential of launching an accelerator for iOS developers.