Paul Tan on the Automotive Industry
The Bangkok Post has an interesting interview with Thawatchai Jungsanguanpornsuk, who is the managing director of Phranakorn Auto Sales, the Phra Nakorn Automobile Group company which handles the Proton brand in Thailand.
He talks about Proton’s market positioning, pricing, and the future of Proton amidst Thai automotive market developments like the Ecocar project, fuel price hikes and a B-car production surge by Thailand’s ‘big three”.
Click here to read.
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Toyota may post first loss in 70 yearsAbout the Author
After dabbling for years in the IT industry, Paul Tan initially began this site as a general blog covering various topics of personal interest. With an increasing number of readers paying rapt attention to the motoring stories, one thing led to another and the rest, as they say, is history. An avid electronic gadget aficionado as well as big-time coffee lover, he's also the executive producer of the Driven motoring TV programme.
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haha… thailand like proton… it’s a good thing…
one thing that attract people to buy proton is the lotus handling dna in proton car… so proton must never consider to sell lotus…
haha… now we know why savvy sell well in thailand… haha…
proton should keep up to improve the car quality…
good luck and good job proton…
it’s time for proton to rise up… come on proton WE rakyat have faith in u…
well done! but pls dont sell all the rejected export version to our market!!!
That’s the way aha aha. I like it aha aha. Kap kung kap, masuk pintu keluar tingkap.
go proton… go proton… now show your claws in asean market…
One of development country that proton should aggresively market/sell their cars. Good luck proton. Proton boleh. malaysia boleh. FAM tak boleh.
Luckily the Thailand government didn’t impose hefty taxes for our exports (which they retracted earlier), since all our imports coming from TomYam land are taxed quite unfairly (due to NAP).
It time for our government to allow less tax for cars coming from TomYam land (Jazz, Yaris, Camry, Aveo, etc)
The specs and pricing is very good in Thailand.
I am wondering the strategy Proton had used in promoting these models overseas with lower than the price in Malaysia. More than 10 years ago I was in Birmingham watching the launch of Proton Satria in UK. At that time the model was not even seen in Malaysia.
Why we as Malaysian has to bear the losses by Proton overseas in terms of having to fork out more for a lower spec car. Proton shd follow the Koreans whereby the people are more willing to use their local cars becoz the specs and price are favoring them. We…..unfortunately is dictated to buy P1 becoz the system is designed to make sure We buy P1. How unfortunate !
http://www.bangkokpost.com/Motoring/04Jan2008_motor008.php
Corrected Link
Paul, the link may be dynamic. The last few digits before *.php seems to change occasionally.
This is what i call Ketuanan Melayu thinking G… Earn own ppl money more by giving cheap spec, while foreign give better spec more faster & better then us.. Such like CPS Gen.2 in Thailand first, UK spec Proton which have Fuel injected Saga, 4 air-bags Waja & TRC (traction control) Perdana…
We should learn like Japan & Korea did to their own market, by giving their own ppl have the best spec..
http://www.bangkokpost.com/Motoring/04Jan2008_motor008.php
Corrected Link
Paul, the link may be dynamic. The last few digits before *.php seems to change occasionally.
positive thinking… proton emerged good in oversea… build quality and standard spec become higher… they can achieve automotive economic scale… price for parts getting lower… fuel quality in malaysia become euro4 compliant.. we have cleaner burn diesel engine… car price become lower… Proton no more interested with Malaysian Money only.. let them obsess with Euro and Dollar… you all can buy ur favourite Japanese car rite?
no big BS with the biodiesel.. where our gov is striving hard to be the big producer while our car don even biodiesel compliant..
BRING DOWN THE DIESEL ROADTAX!!!
Bad biz model:-
1. Selling high quality car at lower price for export market.
2. Selling lower quality car at higher price for domestic market.
Any details “talking” on this interview?
wahlaueh,
our local market still consider as 2nd class…
P1 may answer well to export market… GEN2 with CPS in Tomyam land. Our local market… ‘chin chai’ GEN2 ok lah…
LittleFire85 do your research before leave a comment;
* There is no 4 air-bags Waja or Impian ever produced
* Fuel Injected Saga was sold in Malaysia before- Proton call CARES ( i think you are young at age to remember this )
* and there is no PERDANA exported model
anyway after doing currency converter using yahoo. I’ve compile the result below which i think quiet reasonable for Thailand market as our local model has huge discount from dealer which is up to RM6k..
Proton’s product line-up for the Thai market includes three hatchbacks:
Savvy 1.2-litre (B399,000), = RM 44,000
Neo three-door 1.6-litre (B499,000) = RM 55,000
and Gen-2 five-door 1.6-litre (B549,000).= RM 60,500
Folks, Proton needs to sell as much products as possible to anyone who wants to buy, in as many country as possible. This is to make sales and profit as much as possible in the near future (ie 10 years). Why? To be able to develop global quality, safe, powerful and efficient models of course. And sell to Malaysians at very affordable price. Which leads to lower deaths during accidents (you know la Malaysian drivers..)
So wait la.. 10 more years. Meybe we can drive the equivalent of those Precision German Engineering driving machines.
Oh how lovely “Selamat Datang”. Haa now Proton you better be good as you know they are quite garang one, heh heh.
good job…
proton propaganda machine in full motion. Check out the responses on the site all praising proton. guess they finally figured out there was an internet.
how bout proton eterna? wasnt that an export version of our perdana?
thats if i’m not wrong.
nah, the perdana is basically a galant. It is known as a galant almost everywhere, namely the states, but was called the eterna in some markets. The name sounds better i guess… and ahBengs were quick to change the “p e r d a n a” wordings for “E T E R N A”. lol
building car,
it develop industries as a side effect, it develop human thinking ,it develops know how, and knowledge enrichment,
batter than ‘tak tahu apa, empty soul’
how bout proton eterna? wasnt that an export version of our perdana?
thats if i’m not wrong.
There is no such thing Proton Eterna and its not a Galant related family.. It is Mitsubishi Eterna Japan Domestic Model- JDM which we convert to Perdana. 80% content of Perdana come straight away from Japan. and Mitsubishi Japan never export it since 1995/96 as it didnt pass safety standard. Unless it come from parallel importer
Remember? until now the topline model of Proton doesnt have Airbag even as an optional – this is due to designewise problem – airbag is not plug & play item.
proton is working hard to win back malaysian “stolen” heart.
let’s give them some time and i believe we will be proud of Proton soon.
Bravo Proton..
Anybody made a research on the BLM chassis and suspension? Could be Lotus, the one they used on the Exige or even Europa. If it is, then you’ll sure going to have a damn awesome handling. Slap on the huge wheels, I bet its going to be a cult.
blm front mc pherson, rear torsion beam,
blm is family oriented, but some lavel of firmness of the suspension rear torsion beam arrangement is not a bad handler,
only that if rear torsion beam is soft , like tiara, then handling is bad,
Expecting the BLM’s suspension to be from Exige or even Europa? lol…
Someone’s been seriously brainwashed…….
As Malaysians we should be proud when our cars are being accepted outside.
It must have been good quality with affordable price, otherwise nobody wants to buy. Anyway, good job.
Good job, see how long the Tomyam market can be “silent” toward P1. We bolehland already make hell of noise for the last 20 year!
Always “good-this-and-good-that”, at the end, consumers are the one to make “final judgement” on any cars.
ezralimm said,
January 4, 2008 @ 10:46 am
http://www.bangkokpost.com/Motoring/04Jan2008_motor008.php
————
PROTagONist! he, he, he, ……. the heading said it all.
zaen, how do u explain this?
http://www.euroncap.com/tests/proton_impian_2002/116.aspx
Why no news about export Persona & upcoming BLM?
I don’t bother whether Proton to launch the Gen 2 CPS at Malaysia 1st because it’s without VIM for the one in Thailand!
If i not mistaken the current Gen.2 selling in UK also got 4 air-bags.
What to argue about airbag, Malaysian life is chepor one, apart from cheap labor low wages but barang naik!
altis_fan said,
January 4, 2008 @ 10:00 pm
As Malaysians we should be proud when our cars are being accepted outside.
It must have been good quality with affordable price, otherwise nobody wants to buy. Anyway, good job.
———–
This is export version – high quality low price!
How about low quality high price “MDM” (Malaysian Domestic Market)?
IsaacVky said,
January 4, 2008 @ 11:05 pm
I don’t bother whether Proton to launch the Gen 2 CPS at Malaysia 1st because it’s without VIM for the one in Thailand!
——–
Without VIM, Malaysia one without both?
u never earn money by just being proud..not just bcoz it’s malaysian
means u hv to support them..they must show n prove they are worth
every single respect n support from the malaysian people..u can still
produce a good quality car n yet hv an affordable price tag..
cheap hv never meant to be of low quality…
BigFish said,
January 4, 2008 @ 11:04
PROTagONist! he, he, he, ……. the heading said it all.
____________________________-
?? I just posted a updated link to the article quoted by PaulTan. The link in PT’s blog post is broken.
big fish
Why no news about export Persona & upcoming BLM?
————————————–
u already know the outcome. i am pretty sure proton also knows it. all they gonna tell u is they sent xxx number of cars to some obscure third world country.
BigFish said,
January 4, 2008 @ 10:40 pm
Good job, see how long the Tomyam market can be “silent†toward P1. We bolehland already make hell of noise for the last 20 year!
—————————————————————–
You’re right BigCrap….
they have the choices they dont have to make noise…
zaen said,
January 4, 2008 @ 11:57 am
–i think u should do more homework then others, before making any comments. have u seen a mitsubishi galant before? i almost buy it a used one last two years of the 1995 made which was imported. the dashboard is exactly the same as perdana. eterna and galant were using the same platform and so did perdana. did u ever seen a perdana with a mitsubishi galant or eterna(facelifted) front? ever found out why the fuel injection saga on sale in malaysia without any launching those days? hmm…..u know or not about it? during time, all of course younger……hahahaha.
BigFish said,
January 4, 2008 @ 11:28 pm
Simply because we haven’t got the facelifted one, BigCrap bro.
It’s time for the government to reduce taxes on Thai-imported car, since sales of our Proton cars are above average in Thailand.