Chief executive officer Datuk Madani Sahari said out of that amount, RM1 bil worth of investments would involve services that are aligned with the newly-launched National Automotive Policy (NAP) 2020.
“These are services related to mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) and those related to testing and certification as well as inspection,” he told a media briefing on MARii’s Automotive Industry Performance Update 2019 and Outlook in 2020 here, yesterday.
Part of the investments would involve automotive components, parts and products, he said.
Moving forward, Madani said during 2020, key measures would be executed and would be based on NAP 2020 to accelerate the development of next-generation vehicles (NxGVs) and MaaS in Malaysia, including the adoption of Industry 4.0 technologies.
“As such, the government will be developing an Electric Vehicle Interoperability Centre (EVIC).
“The EVIC will contain various facilities needed for the testing of the NxGVs such as charging stations, smart grid integration solutions and various other infrastructures to accommodate the research and development phase of future mobility,” he said.
Madani said the combination of various facilities in the EVIC would create an NxGV ecosystem based on these future technologies.
“An NxGV test bed is also in the works, which will allow all businesses in the mobility ecosystem to collectively design and validate their products in a single location, in collaboration with all members that contribute to the design pool for autonomous driving,” he added.
In addition to the enhancement of current talent and value chain programmes, the automotive stakeholders can also expect standards development in various areas, such as energy-efficient vehicles (EEVs); EVIC; NxGV; vehicle inspection (vehicle roadworthiness); vehicle inspection (used vehicle evaluation); motor vehicle aftermarket – service, spare parts and sales (3S); and motor vehicle aftermarket – service, spare parts, sales and smash repair (4S).
On the 2020 outlook, Madani said the industry is forecast to continue to grow in terms of total production volume and total industry volume to reach close to 578,000 units and 610,000 units, respectively.
The EEV penetration will also continue to increase to 90% from 87.6% last year.
The export of parts and components including remanufacturing is expected to contribute RM16 bil to the automotive sector this year, he added. – March 4, 2020, Bernama
