Spice Mobiles to Make Handsets in India by 2010-end

Handset maker Spice Mobiles on Thursday said it will start manufacturing mobile phones in the country by the end of this year and plans to sell one million devices from April.

The company will start trial production of handsets in India from next month.

"We already have a facility in Baddi, Himachal Pradesh, where we manufacture other devices. We will start trial production of our handsets from next month and start start the commercial manufacturing following that by the end of this year," Spice Mobiles Director and CEO Kunal Ahooja told reporters after launching its 12-mega pixel (MP) camera phone here.

The phone--S-1200--is priced at Rs 14,500 and has a 12-MP camera with 3X optical zoom.

With aggressive plans to sell one million handsets a month, Spice Mobiles today named actor Sonam Kapoor as it new brand ambassador.

The B K Modi Group-owned company, at present, sells half a million unit in the country.

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As the Indian mobile market expands, most handset makers are seeing a business case in manufacturing handsets locally.

Nokia, which is a leader in the Indian market, has its handset manufacturing factory at Chennai.

Besides manufacturing, Spice Mobiles, which is credited for making dual SIM mobile phones popular, is planning to sell mobile handsets in developing markets of Africa and Asia in a bid to replicate its growth story in India.