Chinese telecom equipment supplier Huawei recently announced that the company will invest into a five-year investment plan worth US$2 billion in India, in a bid to expand its R&D and manufacturing capabilities in the country, the Sohu IT News reported on December 15. Huawei stated that the company will implement four initiatives including build a new R&D facility in Bangalore and an equipment manufacturing facility at Sriperumbudur, near Chennai. These four initiatives are expected to generate job vacancies for 4,000-5,000 people in India over the next five years. Currently, Huawei has a total of 6,000 employees in India, according to the Business Line of India reported on December 15. In addition, Huawei stated that the company will also increase the total number of R&D engineers at its Bangalore plant to 3,000, up from the current 2,000, making the Bangalore plant Huawei's biggest R&D center outside of China, according to the same source. Meanwhile, the manufacturing facility in Sriperumbudur will manufacture network equipment, with an aim to tap growing demand in the Indian market. To date, Huawei has secured contracts from five Indian telecom operators including RCom, Tata Teleservices, Airtel, Idea Cellular and Aircel, competing head-to-head with its European rivals which used to dominate the Indian market.

With an aim to tap the burgeoning mobile phone market in India, Huawei recently launched three Android-powered mobile phones, dubbed the Ideos U8150, X5, and X6. The Ideos U8150 will hit the market by year-end 2010 and the latter two models will be available by mid-January 2011, according to Oneindia News. The Ideos U8150 features a 2.8-inch TFT (Thin Film Transistor) capacitive touchscreen display, Android 2.2 OS, 528MHz processor, Wi-Fi (Wireless-Fidelity) support, and 3.15MP camera phone, without revealing the price tag.