After gaining in market share here, South Korean mobile handset maker Samsung is planning to make India an export hub and for supplying mobile phones to the Middle East and African countries soon.

Exports from India, at present, constitute about 1-3 per cent of its manufacturing volume and the company is targetting to increase it to 10 per cent.

"We are exporting to SAARC countries and about 1-3 per cent of our volumes (from India) are being exported. We are looking at making India an export hub and soon we will start exporting to geographies like Middle East and African countries," Samsung India Country Head (Mobile and IT Business) Ranjit Yadav said.

The aim is to ramp it up to 10 per cent, but no timeline has been fixed, he added .

Samsung manufactures handsets in six facilities in four countries, China (three), Brazil, Vietnam and India.

"India is one of the top three markets for us after the US and China)... Now we are also looking at making it an export hub," Yadav said.

The India facility is in Noida in Uttar Pradesh. Its capacity has recently been tripled from 12 million units annually. Samsung has invested USD 70 million (about Rs 315 crore) for the expansion.

The company manufactures multimedia, dual sim and touchcreen models at the Noida facility, which was set up in August 2007. About 60 models are manufactured here.

It has also added 1,500 employees at the facility, taking its total headcount for mobile phone unit to 4,000 people.

Samsung has been catching up fast with its Finnish competitor Nokia on the back of a strong growth in smartphones and feature phones in India.

According to the latest figures made available by the Voice and Data study, Samsung posted a growth of 21.7 per cent to register revenues of Rs 5,720 crore in 2010-11 from India, from Rs 4,700 crore in the previous fiscal.