MUMBAI - Chinese tech giant Xiaomi on Monday announced plans for its second manufacturing plant in India, which will substantially boost production rates and further the company's expansion ambitions for the country.

The new plant, to be established in partnership with Taiwan electronics major Foxconn, will be built in Sri City in Andhra Pradesh, where the first plant is also located.

"We will have a combined production capacity of one phone per second during operational hours," said Manu Jain, vice-president and managing director of Xiaomi India, at a press conference in New Delhi on Monday.

The move comes as Xiaomi seeks to become the biggest smartphone seller in India in the next three to five years.

The Chinese player, which lost growth traction in its home market amid intensified competition, performed well in India, selling more than 1 million handsets within 18 days in October in the run-up to Diwali, India's biggest festival and the biggest and most important holiday of the year.

Soon after its debut in India in July 2014, Xiaomi started building its first local manufacturing plant, which went into production in August 2015.

By March the following year, over 75 percent of its phones sold in India were made locally.

The company said in its statement that with the new plant that number will rise to more than 95 percent.

Xinhua