Proton Ready For Global Expansion, Incar Kembali Pasar Inggris And Australia

Proton X50. (Doc. Proton Holdings)

JAKARTA - Proton will reportedly carry out a massive global expansion, with one of the markets to be re-exploited to Britain.

Sources reveal that this expansion also includes the right steering market across Asia and South Africa. In addition, the manufacturer, known as the Lion head logo, will also re-enter the Australian and New Zealand markets.

This step was taken to significantly increase Proton's global sales, along with the construction of a new head office and manufacturing base in Tanjung Malim, Malaysia. This facility called Automotive Hi-Tech Valley (AHTV) was built with brand owner Geely and Malaysian industrial conglomerate DRB-HICOM Berhad.

"Through this investment, Proton will have the means to return to the market that was previously abandoned, as well as entering a new market," said the source, quoted from Autocar, Friday, August 9.

The addition of production capacity provided by AHTV will also play an important role in Proton's long-term plans to expand its global sales.

Unfortunately, information about Proton's return to the UK market has yet to be disclosed. However, the manufacturer confirmed that the main export market would be achieved by the end of the decade. For information, Proton has explored the UK market from 1989 to 2014.

Last year, Geely announced plans to invest up to 3.5 billion pounds (around Rp71 trillion) in AHTV development. Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim even mentioned that the actual investment figure was almost 7.9 billion (around Rp160.4 trillion).

Proton now sells four models based on a number of Geely models, such as X50 taken from Binyue, X70 from Boyue, X90 from Haoyue, and S70 from Emgrand.

Proton has also set up its newest EV brand called e:MAS. The first model to launch is e:MAS 7 which is taken from the Geely Galaxy E5 SUV.

The launch of the e:MAS brand came after the opening of a new Proton research and development center at the Geely Research Institute in Hangzhou, China, in April.