Chinese tyre maker Prinx Chengshan recently broke ground on its Malaysian factory at the Kedah Rubber City in Kedah state.
Located in the Kedah Rubber City (138 km from Penang Port and 15 km from the Thai customs pass), the project will cover 102.63 acres with Phase I to establish an annual capacity of producing 6 million premium passenger-vehicle tyres and 600,000 commercial-vehicle tyres.
Chengshan Group Chairman Che Hongzhi, Vice President Shi Futao and Prinx Tire (Malaysia) General Manager Cao Kai joined Malaysian dignitaries and to witness this milestone, it states.
In his speech, the Group Chairman emphasised that the Malaysian factory is anothers strategic overseas foothold following the Thailand base, and will form a “twin stars” configuration with the Thai factory.
He added, “This will not only significantly expand our global production capacity, build a more resilient global supply chain network, and deliver faster and superior services to our global customers, but hold pivotal strategic significance for Prinx Chengshan’s sustainable high-quality development as well. This project responds to the “Belt and Road” initiative while deepening China-Malaysia industrial cooperation.”
The company says over 1,000 production jobs will be created, boosting local suppliers and infrastructure. The facility will also enhance regional supply chain connectivity, establishing itself as a northern manufacturing benchmark to propel the industrial growth in ASEAN.
Drawing extensively from its intelligent factory experience in China and Thailand, the Malaysian factory features three functional zones (production, R&D/office and residential quarters), integrating six core sections (raw material warehouse, moulding shop, mixing shop, curing shop, semi-finished product shop and testing shop) and achieving lean end-to-end production distribution.
The specially designed fully automated warehouse will establish an unmanned dispatching link from raw material warehousing to finished product delivery; coupled with 5G digital collaboration and intelligent quality inspection systems, will create an Industry 4.0 production scenario characterised by “minimal human intervention, high efficiency and precision”, the company says.