[Courtesy of Samsung Electronics]
The Huizhou plant is Samsung's only smartphone manufacturing plant in China after the company closed its plant in Tianjin at the end of 2018. The Huizhou plant has produced smartphones mainly for domestic use.
According to related industry sources, Samsung has decided to stop operating its Huizhou plant within this month. The shutdown has been anticipated since Samsung started cutting its workforce at the plant in early June, along with a voluntary retirement program for employees.
In 2017, the Huizhou plant's annual production volume reached 60 million units or 20 percent of its total smartphone production. Faced with rising labor costs and competition with domestic firms, Samsung's market share in China has plunged from about 20 percent in 2013 to 0.8 percent in 2018.
Samsung has relocated its smartphone production base to Vietnam and India. In July last year, the company opened a new plant capable of producing 120 million smartphones per yea in Noida in northern India. Samsung would use Vietnam as an R&D base. A research center, which is under construction in Hanoi for completion in 2022, will be used to develop next-generation smartphones.
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