Ricardo Strategic Consulting released a report last month which pinpoints Indonesia as one of the key locations for vehicle sales from year 2020 onwards. Indonesia, along with other “Rising 15” countries, had showed promising development in its economy during the past decade, with GDP growth exceeding 9%. The other countries included in the 15 are Malaysia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Thailand.
Frost & Sullivan Asia Pacific also commented that Indonesia is expected to account for 2.3 million vehicles by 2019. Besides the earlier mentioned factors, Frost & Sullivan also noted that this is driven by increased investments in the automotive industry in Indonesia as well as introduction of regulations that help boost domestic automotive growth.
Many automakers had already recognised the potential in Indonesia and are furiously racing to stake an early claim of the market share. Among them is General Motors (GM) which had seen a 120% increase in 2013 sales so far. Subsequently, they will be reopening a shuttered plant in Bekasi to produce passenger vans, in an investment plan amounting to USD150 million.
Besides GM, according to the Indonesian Minister of Industry, MS Hidayat, Volkswagen (VW) will be investing USD266 million to open a manufacturing plant in West Java, in a joint venture with a local firm. It is set to begin churning out vehicles in 2017. VW has yet to official confirm plans but they have not outrightly denied the rumours.
Still, if forecasts are correct, the country is set to rebound next year.
