50,000th locally-assembled Volkswagen produced

12 years after resuming assembly of its vehicles in Malaysia, Volkswagen Group Malaysia (VGM) recently completed the 50,000^th unit at its facility in the HICOM Automotive Manufacturers (Malaysia) complex in Pekan Pahang. In the 1960s and 1970s, Volkswagen models such as the Beetle and the first generation of the Golf were assembled at the ASSB plant in Shah Alam, Selangor.

The milestone unit was a white Golf GTI which is one of the models assembled locally, alongside the Tiguan, Arteon, Tiguan Allspace and Touareg.

Assembly was to have started earlier
Volkswagen had been planning to assemble cars locally as far back as 2004, and had been looking forward to doing so in collaboration with Proton. However, after being led in circles during negotiations to form a partnership, their plan was delayed when the two companies did not come together.

After working on a new plan, the German automaker chose the DRB-HICOM manufacturing complex in Pekan (which began operations in the 1980s as a TATA factory) to have the models assembled locally. The first model to roll out in March 2012 was the Passat (B7), followed by the Polo and Jetta.

Advantage of assembling locally
Local assembly took off about RM14,000 (at that time) for the Passat as it was subject to more preferential duties and VGM also got incentives from the government that helped offset production costs.

With the addition of the Tiguan in 2017, VGM had potentially more models to assemble as the new SUV was built on the MQB platform. This modular platform is also used for a number of other models and the commonality made it easier for assembly.

Golf GTI and Golf R assembled locally
However, it wasn’t until 2020 that VGM added a significant new model – the Golf – to the assembly line. Partly delayed by the pandemic, the inclusion of the Golf (in Mark 8 form) was notable because it included the GTI version. Up till then, the GTI had only been assembled in Germany and China.

This year, the powerful Golf R (below) also began to come out of the Pekan plant and Malaysia is the only other place in the world that this version is assembled.

“To be the first country outside of Germany to assemble this product is a real honour for us. This special mandate given by Germany validates our continuous commitment towards the Volkswagen brand. Now with this new introduction, I am pleased to note that our full range of products here are entirely assembled at the Volkswagen plant in Pekan, Pahang,” said Denyu Bostandzhiev, Managing Director of Volkswagen Passenger Cars Malaysia, when he introduced the Golf R in May this year.

Click here to know more about Volkswagen models in Malaysia

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