Lights, Camera, Apple: Tech Giant Wants No Competition Near Its Mumbai Store

Apple has reportedly asked the Reliance Jio World Drive Mall in Mumbai that around two dozen brands shouldn’t have any kind of presence near its store, which is set to be inaugurated soon.

Citing a lease agreement, an ET report stated that Apple has specified 22 brands, including Amazon, Facebook, Google, LG, Microsoft, Sony, and Twitter, among others, that should be kept out of its exclusive zone. By presence, the iPhone maker has implied stores, hoardings and advertisements.

Per the lease agreement, “The licensor will not give on the license, sub-license, lease, sub-lease or any other arrangement nor allot any of the brands listed as ‘Competing Brands’ to occupy any space for setting up of retail stores for retailing, advertising, selling, offering, displaying and merchandising their products and services within the area of the shopping centre depicted on exclusivity zone.”

Brands such as Bose, Dell, Devialet, Foxconn, Garmin, Hitachi, HP, HTC, IBM, Intel, Lenovo, Nest, Panasonic, and Toshiba are also among the list of 22 brands that are to stay out of Apple’s zone within the mall.

Reportedly, the Cupertino-based tech giant has signed a lease for more than 11 years, with a 15% rent escalation every three years. Apple will pay INR 42 Lakh per month, having rented out 20,800 sq ft of floor space, along with a 2% revenue share for 36 months and 2.5% after that.

Notably, the Mumbai store is Apple’s first store in India after it said it would open three company-owned stores across major cities in India way back in 2020.

The Mumbai store is said to be launched soon, subject to the availability of global Apple executives and may be attended by Apple CEO Tim Cook.

The second store in Delhi’s Select Citywalk Mall may also open later this month, as the store is said to be ready. A similar exclusive zone might have been put in place for the Delhi store.

The move comes amid Apple’s increased focus on India as a market, having conducted an international reshuffle of top sales executives in March to include the South Asian country as a separate sales zone within Asia. Apple is looking to promote its India head, Ashish Chowdhary, who will report to Michael Fenger, Apple’s head of product sales.

During the company’s Q1 2023 earnings call, Apple CEO Tim Cook noted that the iPhone maker posted an all-time high iPhone revenue in India, double-digit growth in the installed base of active iPhones and saw continued adoption of services like Apple Business Essentials, AppleCare, Tap to Pay and Apple Financial Services.

The tech major’s shift in manufacturing towards India saw the company export iPhones worth $1 Bn in December 2022 alone, accounting for a lion’s share of smartphone exports from India in terms of value during the month.

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