As Apple Inc. aims to make deeper inroads in the world’s second-largest mobile phone market by users, the Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. firm is in talks with India’s government to explore making products locally.

Through his ‘Make in India’ initiative, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying to boost technology manufacturing in the country. From a requirement to locally source 30 percent of goods sold in their stores, his government in June exempted foreign retailers for three years.

Asking for financial assistance and outlining its manufacturing plans, was Apple in a letter to the federal government in November, the Journal said.

While an Apple spokesman in India did not immediately respond to an email from the media seeking comments, government representatives were not available to comment on the report.

In the country where its iPhones account for less than 2 percent of Indian smartphones sales, local manufacturing would help Apple open retail stores in India.

A manufacturing facility in southern India is owned by Taiwan’s Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd (Foxconn), which makes Apple devices such as iPhones and iPads.

On the other hand, according to an electronics firm that took apart the device to review its component parts, Apple Inc’s new wireless headphones could be a problem for recyclers.

After having come under fire in the past for constructing its devices so tightly that their components can be difficult to cost-effectively disassemble for recycling, Apple has been promoting a more environmentally conscious image for the company.

But Kyle Wiens, chief executive of iFixit, the company which took apart the AirPods and has previously analyzed other Apple products said Apple’s latest 4-gram wireless headphones, or AirPods, have glued-in tiny lithium batteries that make recycling difficult.

“They’re basically saying this is the future of headphones,” said Wiens. He estimates Apple has sold 1.4 billion pairs of iPhone and iPod headphones, weighing about 31 million pounds. Given that the iPhone 7 ships without a traditional headphone jack, AirPods may signal Apple’s future.

“There could easily be a billion of these things over the next 10 years,” Wiens said.

The $159 AirPods can be returned to the company for recycling, Apple has said.

Positive review have been generated about the headphones which Apple released last week after a one-month delay.

One in each pod and one in an accompanying charging case, the AirPods contain three lithium-ion batteries.

A smelter that will melt them down for the copper inside is where recyclers can shred wired headphones and send them. But since they could catch fire while being destroyed, the lithium-ion batteries in AirPods cannot be shredded.

The AirPods carry regulatory markings that say they are not intended to be thrown away in the trash and should be disposed of as electronics waste.

The labor involved in removing the batteries would make it hard to cost-effectively recover any of the materials from the devices, said Willie Cade, CEO of Chicago-based PC Rebuilders & Recyclers, who was briefed on the AirPods’ construction by iFixit.

“I can’t do it by hand. It’s cost prohibitive,” Cade said, adding that the AirPods would need to go into a shredder, but that “there’s a relatively high risk of fire”.

(Adapted from Reuters)

Categories: Economy & Finance