Essential Motoring 101

Ford Motors is seriously fine-tuning its position in the Asian markets this time. Lets not look too far, vehicle sales for Ford Malaysia was obviously not making the charts. With the launching of 3 new face-lifted models - Focus, Ranger and Everest, as a road user, I hardly see Ford vehicles on the roads since January. Ever since the launch of the Ranger in April this year, I was expecting more of this truck zooming in our Malaysian tarmacs (or jungles) but to my surprise, it was almost impossible to spot any. Why is this happening, despite the fact that Ford produces one of the best trucks in the world? Poor marketing strategies? Lacked of market and customer research? Lack of distribution networks?

No matter how tough the situation is for Ford Malaysia to achieve high vehicle sales, I think it is quite timely that they should seriously have a roundtable brainstorming session to clearly identify what Asian’s want in their next car purchase. According to The Star online news today, Ford is making its critical move to seriously expand its business activities to cater to the demands of this part of the world. They will be more focusing in the sedan segment ,with prices ranging from RM60,000 - RM70,000.

After having the chance to really test drive the amphibious Ranger pick-up truck, I would seriously consider to own a Ford one day. The built quality on every aspect of the truck is superbly sturdy and definitely a no slacker with the new TDCi powerplant. I have yet to test drive a Focus though, but had the chance to get on to an older version of it. The ride handling is nonetheless stable and secured too.

In my opinion, Ford Malaysia had made its mark back in the late 90s with the Ranger Splash and had served the construction industry diligently over the years. It is a good initiative to have their vehicles to be more ‘localised’ in terms of features and pricing in order to stay competitive in the Malaysian automotive industry.