Back in the middle of last year, reports started to emerge suggesting that Samsung was planning on moving some of their manufacturing to Indonesia. In fact, the reports were not exactly stating Samsung were moving their manufacturing, but instead Samsung was preparing to open a new manufacturing plant in Indonesia. One of the reasons as to why the South Korean giant was thought to be making this move, was due to the recent legislation the Indonesian Government brought in. The legislation in question sought to make sure that big and foreign importers had to ensure they were creating jobs in what is a fast growing market in Indonesia, while in turn, would also help to cut down on the number of handsets which were being imported internationally into Indonesia.
Of course, the legislation in itself (and Samsung’s decision to be considering an Indonesian manufacturing move) were both aspects of a much larger point. The fact, that Indonesia is quickly becoming one of the biggest emerging markets in the smartphone market. As a result of this growth in Indonesia, the government naturally would prefer to see the manufacturing (of what is becoming a massive domestic market) based in Indonesia. That said, from Samsung (and other manufacturers) point-of-view, there was always the added incentive of being able to reduce costs, by manufacturing for one of the biggest emerging markets, in the emerging market.
Well, the latest on this point is that a report from the Wall Street Journal (source link below) states that Samsung have indeed already began manufacturing in Indonesia. In fact, the WSJ source, “a person familiar with the matter“, states that Samsung began manufacturing in Indonesia back in January of this year. The plant location is reported to be based just outside of Jakarta (Cikarang) and it is also suggested that through this plant, Samsung will be expecting to manufacturer somewhere in the region of 1.5 million handsets per month. The source goes on to confirm that Samsung will be manufacturing their latest “4G-enabled smartphone” and will begin selling domestically to consumers this month. At present, Samsung has yet to confirm any of the information. You can read the full details of the WSJ report by clicking the source link below.