Donald Trump has said he expected Apple would begin ‘upping their production in the US’ - Leah Millis/Reuters

Donald Trump has told Apple to stop building iPhones in India and bring production to the US, as the tech giant battles to avoid punishing tariffs.

The US president on Thursday said he had called Tim Cook to complain after the Apple chief executive told investors the company expects to source the majority of its iPhones sold in the US from its suppliers in India by June.

US bosses are coming under pressure to switch manufacturing away from China, where exports are subject to 30pc tariffs before entering the American economy.

Speaking at a press conference in Qatar, Mr Trump said: “I had a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday. I said to him, ‘My friend, I treated you very good. You’re coming here with $500bn [£375bn]. But now I hear you’re building all over India. I don’t want you building in India.’”

Apple has said it will spend $500bn in the US over the next four years, investing in technical jobs in chip design and an advanced manufacturing facility in Texas – which will produce servers for its artificial intelligence data centres.

However, Mr Trump has pushed Apple to go further, with officials calling for the company to build iPhones in the US.

Apple has long said this would be impractical, while analysts have pointed out that “Made in America” iPhones would increase the cost of the devices many times over.

Trump: ‘India can take care of themselves’

Mr Trump said on Thursday he expected Apple would begin “upping their production in the United States”.

The US president said: “We put up with all the plants that you build in China for years. We’re not interested in you building in India. India can take care of themselves ... We want you to build here.”

Not all of Apple’s iPhone supply chain is based in China. Much of its iPhone production is carried out by Taiwanese manufacturing giant Foxconn, which employs hundreds of thousands of people at sites such as Zhengzhou, dubbed “iPhone City”.Much of Apple’s iPhone production is carried out by Taiwanese manufacturing giant Foxconn in Vietnam - Linh Pham/Bloomberg

While Apple has shifted some production to India, most of its iPhones intended for export outside of the US will still be made in China.

Mr Trump’s comments followed claims that the US and India, which has historically been fiercely protectionist, were close to a trade deal.

The president said New Delhi had “offered us a deal where basically they are willing to literally charge us no tariffs”.

Mr Trump’s outburst about iPhone production risks further frustrating Indian officials after the president claimed to have secured a ceasefire between India and Pakistan after a series of strikes by offering trade incentives.

His tour of the Middle East this week has seen him claim to have signed hundreds of billions of dollars worth of trade deals as he seeks to build ties in the region and boost investment.

These included a $142bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia to provide “state-of-the-art war fighting equipment and services from over a dozen US defence firms”.

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