Automotive industry in Malaysia

The automotive industry in Malaysia consists of 27 vehicle producers and over 640 component manufacturers.^[1] The Malaysian automotive industry is the third largest in Southeast Asia, and the 23rd largest in the world, with an annual production output of over 500,000 vehicles. The automotive industry contributes 4% or RM 40 billion to Malaysia's GDP, and employs a workforce of over 700,000 throughout a nationwide ecosystem.^[1]

The automotive industry in Malaysia traces its origins back to the British colonial era. Ford Malaya became the first automobile assembly plant in Southeast Asia upon its establishment in Singapore in 1926. The automotive industry in post-independence Malaysia was established in 1967 to spur national industrialisation. The government offered initiatives to encourage the local assembly of vehicles and manufacturing of automobile components. In 1983, the government became directly involved in the automotive industry through the establishment of national car company Proton, followed by Perodua in 1993. Since the 2000s, the government had sought to liberalise the domestic automotive industry through free-trade agreements, privatisation and harmonisation of UN regulations.

The Malaysian automotive industry is Southeast Asia's sole pioneer of indigenous car companies, namely Proton and Perodua. In 2002, Proton helped Malaysia become the 11th country in the world with the capability to fully design, engineer and manufacture cars from the ground up.^[2] The Malaysian automotive industry also hosts several domestic-foreign joint venture companies, which assemble a large variety of vehicles from imported complete knock down (CKD) kits.

The automotive industry in Malaysia primarily serves domestic demand, and only several thousand complete built up (CBU) vehicles are exported annually.^[3] Exports of Malaysian made parts and components have nonetheless grown significantly in the last decade, contributing over RM 11 billion to Malaysia's GDP in 2016.^[1]