PHP to rev up car assembling capacity

In line with the growing market trend of brand new cars, PHP Automobiles, one of the country's leading car makers, plans to increase its assembling capacity as well as locally manufacturing a majority of the components.

Now, the company's factory employs about 265 workers to assemble 10-12 vehicles per shift.

There are plans to add three more shifts very soon as the company is getting good response from corporate sales. On Wednesday, PHP Automobiles handed over 50 models of the Proton SagaMC 2021 brand to Popular Life Insurance Company.

At the beginning of this year, the company sold 50 cars to Alpha Islami Life Insurance and 35 cars to Sonali Life Insurance Company.

According to the company's officials, in mid-2015, the PHP family announced the addition of new cars with the slogan 'Amader Rastai, Amader Gari'.  PHP's cars came to the market for the first time in mid-2017 with the launch of the Proton Saga 2017 model.

The company has already successfully marketed six models of Malaysia's Proton band, such as the Proton New Saga, Proton Saga MC, Proton Preve, Proton Persona, Proton Exora and Proton X-70 (Microbus).

Akhtar Parvez, managing director of the company, told The Daily Star that PHP Automobiles launched the country's first voice controlled car in early 2020.

"After getting a good response from the buyers in technology and modern model cars, we have changed the body as well as using advanced technology in all our models," he said.

Considering the present demand, there are plans to bring electric-powered vehicles as well.

"I hope to have a separate electric car showroom in Dhaka by next December," he said, adding that they have plans to bring electric motorcycles to the market by 2022.

At present, PHP has showrooms in Dhaka, Chattogram and Sylhet. There are plans to have showrooms in all the divisions and important districts of the country in phases, officials said.

"Now our car parts are not yet available. So in order to ensure the highest service to the customers, we are delivering the parts online to any part of the country within 24 hours and also with 5 years of after-sales service," Parvez said.

Besides, PHP offers another car as a free option for customers to use during the first car servicing. As a result, consumers have no reason to worry about the equipment crisis.

"In addition to the addition of electric cars and motorcycles, we have plans to make important parts in the country. At present, a car requires about 800 parts, both small and large. We are already making about 25 parts in the country, hopefully, in the next one year, we will be able to manufacture most of the important parts in our factory," he added.

PHP's factory located at Sagarika in Chattogram has the capacity to make 1,200 vehicles in a year through single shifts.

Regarding the price of the car, Parvez said they will try to sell new cars at the price of the reconditioned ones.

"At present, we have succeeded in this direction," he added.

Parvez went on to say that about 80-85 per cent of the country's car market is owned by reconditioned cars.

Buyers are more interested in reconditioned cars due to their lower prices.

"The prices of our new cars are close to the same quality reconditioned cars. As a result, buyers are getting good response," Parvez said.

Car sales has seen a drastic fall due to the ongoing pandemic.

At present, around 40-50 cars are sold every month.

"We hope that when this situation is resolved, more than 100 cars will be sold every month," Parvez said.