India loses Wistron

After doing business in India for more than fifteen years, the Taiwanese electronics company, Wistron, will be winding down its operations imminently.

Sources close to the matter told businessline that the company will mostly withdraw from India, and likely to approach the National Company Law Tribunal and the Registrar of Companies to dissolve its India operations within the next year.

Tata takeover
businessline had already reported last month that Tata Electronics was going to take over Wistron’s iPhone manufacturing facilities in Karnataka, which constitute the largest portion of its overall business in India.

However, it also had companies registered in India in the Internet of Things space and was also courting American laptop companies and OEMs in the EV space, but none of these plans are likely to materialise in India any more.

The iPhone manufacturing plant, run by Taiwan-based tech giant Wistron Corporation at Kolar district, in Karnataka Tata Group set to complete Wistron’s iPhone plant buyout deal this month

Wistron’s first India subsidiary was incorporated in the country in 2008 as a sales and maintenance service center, “ICT Service Management Solutions (India) Private Limited,” according to the company’s annual report.

According to the 2021 annual report of the Taiwanese Electronics player, two more of its subsidiaries are registered in India, “Wistron InfoComm Manufacturing (India) Private Limited” which was constituted in 2018, (under which the Taiwanese player bagged the Apple contract), and “Smartiply India Private Limited” incorporated in India in 2020, whose business is product and platform development for IoT. Both of these companies are going to be dissolved.

The only operations that are likely to remain in the country is Wistron’s services business for the repair and maintenance of Apple products.

Once the takeover of the iPhone plant by Tata Electronics is complete, the company can initiate the winding-down process. Sources also told that Wistron is also waiting for some more subsidy payments under the mobile PLI scheme, before it initiates the winding down process.

Wistron employes over 12,000 people in India most of whom are employed in the unit being acquired by the Tata group. The Hindu BusinessLine