Nokia Chennai Factory First to Manufacture 5G radio Equipment in India

by Shrutee K/DNS

First telecom factory in India to start manufacturing 5G base stations

Chennai is one of the largest telecom manufacturing unit in India, catering to both domestic and the international markets and shipping to over 100 countries

The plant is a significant contributor to the Indian government’s `Make in India’ program to promote domestic manufacturing

New Delhi, India – Nokia’s state-of-the-art manufacturing unit in Chennai in South India has started manufacturing 5G New Radio (NR) based on the 3GPP 5G New Radio Release 15 standard. The Chennai plant  is one of the largest telecom equipment manufacturing plant in the country, recently reaching the 4 million unit annual production milestone of 2G, 3G and 4G units. It serves both domestic as well as global customers, shipping to over 100 countries.

Data use has grown tremendously over last several years. In India alone, the average consumption was 7.4 GB of data per user per month on mobile devices over mobile networks, placing India ahead of developed markets like the UK, South Korea and France.* This is set to increase significantly in 5G era with billions of connected devices. 5G NR will support such data consumption by providing significantly more network capacity, higher user throughput and lower latency with increased network reliability.

Nokia’s state-of-the-art Chennai factory produces a range of telecom equipment across technologies, and now will include 5G gear in its shipments as network deployments start.  As part of an on-going program, known as the ‘Conscious** factory’, the Nokia Chennai plant recently implemented the first 'real-world' Smart Manufacturing application of Industry 4.0 in India leveraging solutions such as Augmented and Virtual Reality (AR/VR), connected Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data Analytics, and Internet of Things to enhance operations and increase productivity.  The plant is equipped with cutting-edge manufacturing technologies, such as the state-of-the-art surface mounting technology, with a capacity of 12.8 billion components every year, 3D automated optical inspection and X-Ray inspection capability.

Sanjay Malik, senior vice president and head of the India Market, at Nokia, said, “This is another big leap towards the ‘Make in India’ vision as our factory continues to contribute to the Indian economy and the country’s growing profile as a manufacturing and engineering hub. Nokia was the first to leverage the skills and capabilities in India and start manufacturing telecom networks equipments in the country in 2008, and developthe local supply chain for various components. We are now pioneering 5G manufacturing in the country, making India and the world ready for 5G.”

**To address Industry 4.0, Nokia has applied a 'Conscious Supply Network' concept at its factories leveraging digitalization, analytics, and robotics across the overall supply chain.

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