Apple’s first physical retail store is located in the populous city of Mumbai.Punit Paranjpe | Afp | Getty ImagesFor years, Tim Cook has been bullish on India. Now, he’s betting big on the South Asian giant as Apple shifts its focus away from China and expands its footprint in India.Still, analysts told CNBC the iPhone-maker’s dependency on China will remain for years to come. related investing news 4 hours agoThere’s potential for India to “become the next China” for Apple production, but it could take as long as a decade before it happens, said Martin Yang, senior analyst of emerging technologies at Oppenheimer & Co. Apple is set to open its second India retail store in Delhi Thursday, two days after opening its first in Mumbai.The Cupertino-based tech giant still has a strong presence in China due to its supply chain partners, and China’s infrastructure capabilities are still far better than what India can offer, Nitin Soni, senior director at Fitch Ratings told CNBC. “It will take Apple years to diversify away from China,” Soni said. “The country is still a very large pocket for Apple — not just in the assembly line, but the semiconductor ecosystem and testing as well.”Apple’s efforts to move its assembly of products from China became more urgent in the last five years as U.S.-China trade tensions intensified, and supply chain disruptions caused by Beijing’s zero-Covid policy unraveled. The iPhone maker had to scale back production in China due to those restrictions, a move that hurt its bottom line.The population growth and pure opportunity around India is the golden goose for Apple.Dan IvesWedbush SecuritiesIt is also highly unlikely that Apple will be able to completely eradicate its reliance on China, said Navkendar Singh, an associate vice president with International Data Corporation (IDC) India.”Given the cost scales, logistics, and sheer inertia of some of the suppliers in the ecos …
