Part of Proton’s future plans includes expanding its presence in export markets. Earlier in the year, the national carmaker made an official return into the Chilean market with its Preve and Exora. With other potential markets, including emerging ones like Africa and South America, being potential targets for Proton, what’s the hold up in entering them?
It is not the lack of trying, according to Tun Dr Mahathir. The Proton chairman explains that even though the carmaker had exported its cars to markets like Argentina, Egypt and Australia, the penetration rate hasn’t been very encouraging.
Among the examples cited for this, are products that weren’t very different from their Japanese parentage. Additionally, restrictive national policies put in place by the respective countries further limits Proton’s emergence in these markets.
Tun Mahathir also points out that Proton has to sell cars at a much lower price in countries such as Egypt, not just to meet production volume demands, but to compete against locally-assembled cars there. A CKD operation in Egypt was previously mooted by Proton, and it may want to reaffirm those plans in the future.
However, these plans will require a lot of planning, including a proper study of the market and ensuring the vehicle designed fits the market’s needs. This isn’t an overnight job, and requires time. Can Proton spare the time to do so? Let us know what you think in the comments below.
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One word business not making money, no future, best solution cut loss and close it down before it burdens more ppl.
Bradder Lok,may I ask 1 important question.
With the internet and websites like Paultan,which country would like to import Protons when they have the Detroit of Asia,Thailand exporting millions of Japanese cars which are cheaper( without Bolehland’s excessive duties)?
Until our dear Tun can answer this,the export market for Proton is practically dead.
By end 2016,Proton’s sales would be around 70,000 units.
Give 1 more final sayornara year,it will be less than 50,000 units.
It is not pushing out socalled new models.People dont want a proton,simple as that.
The PERCEPTION is Proton is just not good enough to compete.
You’re Albert Yong?
I am so surprised at why Tun is making announcements. Usually CEO of a company makes announcements. The chairman is only the figurehead.
here, the CEO of Proton looks like he has no balls. Everything also make Tun announce. Unless of course, Proton is paying Tun big bucks to make announcements. This should not be the way, cause Proton is bleeding money and it needs to conserve money and not be paying super high salaries to its Chairman.
Since Proton is of public interest ie because it has sucked over RM100 billion of our LHDN money to stay afloat since 1990, we have the right to know how much Proton is paying its Chairman and what remuneration he has and benefits.
Many CEOs of big companies in Malaysia cannot understand why the puppet CEO of Proton, who also earns 6 figure salary per month is not doing anything but making a 90 year old man do the announcing.
Like that, better kick the CEO out and can save about RM20mil to RM30 mil per annum on his salary and bonus.
What brader Albert says is true. Actually Proton sales is not 100k last year. it is technically misleading. Proton sales are only about 10,000 to 20,000 to the public. That is the real sales.
The 80,000 to 100,000 was sold to Government departments and Ministries. They have been strictly told to buy and support Proton. Just like MAS, all government servants fly on Business Class on MAS to keep it afloat. Otherwise MAS long time ago close shop.
Every Ministry and Government departments make up the 80% to 90% sales of Proton. And guess whose money Government is using? Our tax payer money lah!
“Just like MAS, all government servants fly on Business Class on MAS to keep it afloat.”
Lol where did pick this from? Sky?
Ye ke bro? Adik aku keje pegawai gomen balik kampung pakai airasia je. Dia kata jabatan dia xde duit utk beli tiket Business class MAS, mahal tu. Susah juga nak percaya tulisan di Internet ni. Info dapat dari mana tah. Takpela yg penting aku tak sebarkan fitnah. Takut wo kene azab kat neraka nanti. Yg tak takut Tuhan bole la terus sebarkan fitnah.
Everyone knows Proton Business model is not viable in the long run.The competition is just too big to to handle.
Rather than close down, the best solution was to merge and they had this opportunity some years back with VW but some Al BukHARY Potter poison the mind of Najib and the rest is history.
Seeing how VW’s dieselgate scandal was such a huge impact on the group’s total sales and reputation, it was a good call not to let Proton being part of the German automakers’ stable.
Personally Proton should merge with Fuji Heavy Industries for capital and then they can start realizing their new plans.
Proton is like Petronas. During good times, songlap the money big time. Proton and Petronas was making big bucks. Petronas for instance was making RM100 billion per year during good years.
Instead of keeping it in reserve, all the directors of Proton and UMNO’s Private Bank Petronas sapu the money big time.
Compare that to Sweden, every single rakyat of Sweden has a Sovereign Fund kept by the Government for every single citizen. This makes each citizen a millionaire (In USD). Yes, every single citizen has a share in the oil wealth of the country and this money is for each citizen to take and use.
But Malaysia terbalik, UMNO songlap all the money of Petronas until Petronas crying now got no money. Every year the past 40 years, rape Petronas puas puas.
Proton also the same. When making good money, UMNO rape it nicely all their money. Proton could not keep reserve for rainy days like now.
At the end of the day, Mahathir can talk all he wants but it is YOU and your UMNO gang that made Proton bankrupt!
We heard enough of your babbling. Let us know when you plan to close down Proton. The least we can do is celebrate the farewell party with fireworks
U WANT TO CLOSE THE PLANT BECAUSE YOU WANT THE MALAYS TO BEGGARS IN THEIR OWN COUNTRY. AND THE CHINESE TO BE NEW RAJA?
DAP: Just as planned
If they wanna be beggars, a car manufacturer can’t save them. If they don’t want to be beggars, close this junk car maker also no impact. Don’t overestimate a car maker. They just making car.
Close down Proton is to stop it from sucking more money from the country, nothing to do with race. It’s good for all rakyat of Malaysia, except for cronies
P.S. Only UMNO john will diagree
Support P1 = Support Tun M = Support Bersih = Support Party Hard = Support Dear Leader becum PM = Support ABU
Who is ABU?
John,nobody wants to close down protong,cos many jobs are at stake.One of my friends is working at protong.
It is the way the company runs ,which leads to its own downfall.
Unless a Carlos Ghosn type guy comes and takes over,Perodua will continue to surge ahead,with Honda,Toyota,Nissan all outpacing Protong soon.
Look at MAS now,after chopping 6000 dead wood,the company is leaner and coming out of intensive care very soon.The orang putih is turning around a decade of SHIT MANAGEMENT,towards profitability.
Make no mistake,we can write and joke about the sad state of affairs at proton,but if things continue like it is…..you can see the self fulfilling prophecy comes to pass.
Proton ,is just not good enough.
Like that, we also need to trim the Government Servants. 1.5 million Government Servants to cater for 30 million Malaysians.
Australia, a much bigger country and same population number, has only 250,000 Government Servants.
Just like Proton and MAS, it is draining the Government!
That’s because here armies are included in that number but outside. Why you no read?
should your plan succeeds, please reduce the price to local units.
once your volume goes up, the cost to build cars locally should decrease since your development cost has been spread out globally.
if not, i’ll lose hope on u guys and hope u guys burn to the ground. and got bought by some european company and by then, i’ll return to support u guys.
If Proton can become No.1 car in Bangladesh, they can become No.1 pretty much at any market elsewhere too.
Proton (and also Perodua) has been trying to build a factory in Egypt for decades. Honestly, I cannot accept some of these excuses here; Egypt is not Syria or Iraq, they aren’t exactly stable, but stable enough all things considered. Also, what happened to Proton’s plans in Iran ? Their CKD partnership with Zagross Khodro was actually very successful, at one point, they were selling as much as 7,000 Iranian-built Proton cars in Iran alone. Then, just as things were going well, Proton abandoned their Iranian plans… I’m assuming, it was due to UN sanctions, or was it ? Could it have been some other form of political (or even religious) misunderstanding ? Whatever the case, Proton will probably never tell us what happened.
I fully support the idea of building an assembly plant in Egypt. However, I would prefer if Proton chose Turkey instead. Turkey is the ‘Thailand of Europe’; many of the cars built in Turkey are then exported to European countries. Proton and Turkey go way back, in fact, I’d say Turkey is among Proton’s best export markets. Even today, Proton makes LHD GEN-2s and LHD Personas for Turkey (and also Egypt), because demand is still significant. Bear in mind, we’re talking about a near 12-year old car here, not the Iriz or Suprima S. Imagine what would happen if Proton brought their newer cars to Turkey (and Egypt) ? Surely, they would sell well.
Recently, our Jibby presented a LHD Perdana (Accord-based) Limousine to Turkey’s president, Mr. Erdogan. To me, this is very suspicious… but who knows what Jibby is planning.
Also, there are quite a few Proton clubs in Turkey, and you’ll note that many of the members are happy to support Proton because it is “from a fellow Muslim country”. And there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact, among all the Muslim-majority countries, only Malaysia and Iran can design mass-produced cars by themselves. But Iran still uses French or Chinese technology (platforms, engines etc.) though, and they still have much to learn, but they will soon enough.
Proton missed a golden opportunity in Egypt, when China-based Chery partnered with Egyptian Speranza Motors to create new ‘Egyptian national cars’. The modern, cheap and well-equipped Speranza cars now dominate the market. And they’re not even that good… If Proton had worked with Speranza, they would have made great strides in Egypt today. What to do. To date, Kuwait has the record for Proton’s best market share in a Middle Eastern country, with as much as 8% market share in the late 90s and early 2000s.
It all boils down to poor management from Proton. They should forget about national pride if the company are being managed by politically influenced people. Because our politicians are mostly not patriotic to begin with. The rakyats are the real patriots.
Let other talented ppl build a car for u.
Correct. According to Malaysians, Malaysians got no talent. Onli stay in trees. We shud worship our foreign overlords
When p1 can outsell Malaysia’s biggest car company, P2. That would be a good indicator to star export.
yes. proton hv to look beyond our shore…
as such the car designed should allow it to be sold or assembled in export market as well…
Just Cut all the Crap…No matter what you said… Most of us will Said “No! to Proton”. It Too late. Proton brand is heavily damaged!..
Since Msia is having such good rapport with Bangladesh and out of brotherly love, why not go CKD there? Enough advertisement & publicity due to the enormous impact Msia has on this country.
If you still fail in a country of 162 million
then just close shop !!.
… or hire the 1.5M banglas to CKD for us in Proton factory in Tanjung Malim! :P
If you CKD car in bangladesh, you will require absolutely NO machinery. All hand made! :D
I have a car.this car is proton.my car is not beauty.i can make beauty.