You’d think that a new plant in Indonesia would severely affect the production of locally-assembled cars here, wouldn’t you? But Hyundai is set to do things differently, despite also planning to move its regional headquarters from Mutiara Damansara to Jakarta by the end of 2021.
According to a report by The Edge Markets, Sime Darby Motors expects the volume of Hyundai models being assembled at its Inokom plant in Kulim, Kedah to actually increase as part of the move. This is due to the tax savings brought on by sourcing the CKD kits from Indonesia instead of South Korea. The company owns Hyundai-Sime Darby Motors (HSDM), Hyundai’s official distributor and importer in Malaysia.
A Sime Darby Motors spokesperson outlined HSDM’s plans for the next two years, which include imported CBU models this year and CKD SUVs the next. “HSDM has plans to introduce several fully imported models to the Malaysian market in 2021, followed by locally-assembled SUV models in 2022. These award-winning models are highly anticipated models with great success in sales volume during their recent global launches.
“Meanwhile, our Hyundai assembly operation aims to continue assembling Hyundai models for the domestic market. In fact, with Hyundai’s new plant in Indonesia expected to produce right-hand drive assembly kits, which brings added value through tax savings for sales of vehicles, we look forward to increasing our assembly volume for Hyundai vehicles at Inokom,” the spokesperson said.
Hyundai’s completely knocked-down kits are currently from Korea and are subject to tariffs of between five percent and 80%. Indonesia-sourced kits won’t be saddled with those taxes thanks to the ASEAN Free Trade Agreement (AFTA).
The spokesperson said that HSDM will be introducing “more interesting” products to Malaysia starting this year, building on the launch of the Kona SUV and the Elantra and Sonata sedans in 2020. It will also be planning the local assembly of new models in Kulim, which currently produces the Santa Fe. The company sold 1,400 vehicles in 2020, down 37.9% compared to the 2,256 units that left dealer lots in 2019.
Hyundai’s new plant in Bekasi, Jakarta is the company’s first to be built in Southeast Asia, costing the carmaker US$1.55 billion (RM6.2 billion). Announced in November 2019, it will begin production in the second half of the year, with an initial capacity of 150,000 units; around half of those will be exported to other markets. The factory will eventually be expanded to produce 250,000 vehicles a year.
This development will be a shot in the arm for Hyundai Motor Group’s fortunes in the region. In 2019, it sold 184,595 Hyundai and Kia vehicles in Southeast Asia, far below the combined total of 2.63 million units racked up by Japanese brands.
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Palisade coming to M’sia??
Good to see that Sime Darby Hyundai are now getting more serious. This time, Sime Darby Hyundai will do it better than before
Can any sane authority in Bolehland explain how come Rm6.2 Billion of Hyundai investment flew to Jakarta?
Are we that teruk that we cant attract Hyundai Korea to place their mega plant in Bolehland?
Something must be wrong somewhere.
Here,thousands are retrenched due to the virus.Jakarta also has huge number of covid cases.Why are they more attractive than Bolehland?
Is Mr.Jokowi more hensem,enterprising,friendly ,warm or what?
How many jobs can Rm6 Billion investment create?
According to leaks, the Indonesian plant will produce three core models: Creta (2021) and its long wheelbase 7-seater derivative, Xpander-like MPV (2022) and Accent, both sedan and hatchback (2022). All of them are expected to be assembled in Malaysia and Vietnam by knock-down kits, as Hyundai intended to ‘invade’ the whole ASEAN, not just Indonesia.
hahaha CBU models sell well first in 2021 then talk about CKD models in 2022.
pls bring the palisade to malaysia
why is it not possible for Hyundai to assign Malaysia produce 1 model and export to 9 other Asean countries? and maybe Australia??
is it so hard? in my mind maybe the Tuscon. maybe plus 1 more model. and other countries like Indonesia will also do the same. hey! whats the point of AFTA then (0-5% import tax).
toyota and daihatsu has been doing the same since 2006 (wish, camry, yaris from thailand. rush from indonesia. myvi becoming sirion)
no thanks to Tun again – Bapa Automotif Malaysia
Hyundai is not following Tun idea because obsoleted, They are following Jokowi ideas.