Bullish Market 2010 For Perodua

2010....coming soon

PETALING JAYA, Oct 20 (Bernama) -- Perusahaan Otomobil Kedua Sdn Bhd (Perodua) expects to sell 176,000 cars in 2010 with the launch of its multi-purpose vehicle (MPV) which is expected to boost the sales.

Managing director, Syed Abdull Hafiz Syed Abu Bakar, said the second national car was on track to meet its target of 162,000 units for 2009 despite the global economic slowdown.

It sold 167,000 units in 2008.

"We are looking at bullish market in 2010 because we have three strong models to sell, MPV, Viva and Myvi," he told reporters after the launch of its RM6 million Body & Paint Hub (B&P Hub) here Tuesday.

"With the new MPV, which is expected to bring in sales of about 3,500-4,000 units a month, the Myvi, the best seller with over 70,000 units sold a year and over 50,000 units sold for Viva, we believe next year will bring us into a new record year," he said.

The new MPV will be launched in early November with the selling price ranging from RM56,000 to RM65,000 per unit.

Syed Abdull Hafiz said he was optimistic the 2009 car sales would surpass the Malaysian Automotive Association's full-year total industry volume forecast of 500,000 units.

"Although, the forecast number is lower compared with last year's 548,115 units, the local motor vehicle industry is still not bad compared with other countries as consumer spending is still strong.

"Personally, I believe sales can touch as high as 520,000 units," he said.

On the National Automotive Policy review, Syed Abdull Hafiz said Perodua hoped the government would continue to support the local industry players.

"We want the industry to develop, we don't want an oversupply, especially in terms of the numbers of vendors," he said, adding that he hoped Perodua and Proton would continue lead the passenger car market with 75 per cent share.

Meanwhile, Perodua's sales and after sales director, Ahmad Suhaimi Anuar, said the company planned to build four new B&P hubs by 2012 with investment of between RM4 million and RM6 million each.

Two of the four hubs would be in the northern and southern regions of the Klang Valley while the remaining two will be in the northern and southern regions of Peninsular Malaysia.

He said Perodua service intakes were forecast to increase to 1.56 million this year from 1.37 million in 2008.

For the first nine months of this year, Perodua service outlets recorded a total of 1.2 million intakes.

-- BERNAMA