Modenas, one of Malaysia's largest manufacturer of motorcycles and scooters with 870,000 assembled as of August 2005, aims to manufacture its one millionth two-wheeler next year, reported Bernama. "We are confident of reaching our one millionth production before the end of next year," said its group chairman Tan Sri Mohd Saleh Sulong. Speaking at the launch of the company's 10th model, the Elit Sports here last night, he said that in the first six months of this year, Modenas had sold 55,000 units of motorcycles and scooters with a market share of 24.5 percent. Some of the Modenas motorcycles and scooters are exported to 13 countries. Sales of the motorcycles and scooters for the first half of 2005 totalled 225,000 units. "This provides the confidence that the forecasted industry sales of 450,000 units this year is achievable with a 13 percent increase from last year," he said. Given this upbeat market scenario, Mohd Saleh said that Modenas is optimistic of controlling 27 percent of the market share this year with sales of 120,000 units. Commenting on the newly-launched Elit Sports, he said that the scooter is in the highly competitive market given the influx of Chinese-made moped and scooters that were sold 30 percent cheaper compared with the Japanese-branded models. Despite this competition, Modenas had sold 7,900 units of scooters last year with a 14 percent market share, he said. He also said that given its aggressive marketing, Modenas had raised sales of its scooters in the first six months of this year to 8,700 units with a market share of 32.3 percent. The new scooter is produced in technical collaboration with Taiwan's Motive Power Industry. "We are optimistic of selling 3,000 units in the last four months of this year and another 6,000 units next year," he added.
