In case you haven’t heard, there’s a global chip shortage that’s throwing a spanner in the works of car manufacturing. No, it isn’t potato chips for the assembly line workers but microchips or semiconductors; something that modern require in abundance to function.
Even Perodua wasn’t spared from the global chip shortage and attributed that alongside the pandemic to a hit in sales for May 2021 to the tune of 12 per cent over April 2021.
In solid figures, that’s 17,973 units sold in May against the 20,399 it shipped out in April. It might not seem like much but every unit counts if the country’s leading carmaker is to achieve the 240,000 units sales target for the year.
Nonetheless, their still adamant they’ll push 240,000 units this year even with that slight hiccup.
Although their year-to-date (YTD) sales up to May 2021 stands at 96,281 units against the same period last year of just 52,920; it should be noted that 2020 was the year of the pandemic and the movement control order for much of the first half prevented sales from going through.
A fairer comparison would be with the figures of 2019; 105,745 units, which they aren’t far off.
The 240,000 units Perodua is aiming for is to equal their all-time sales record of 240,341 units in 2019. Though current figures are approximately 10 per cent behind 2019’s YTD, they can count on the government’s sales tax exemption to boost sales in the second half of 2021 as well as the reported all-new Alza that’s slated for a year-end launch.
As for operational hours of their service centres, owners are advised to contact their nearest service centres for the latest hours and procedures. If whatever your car needs tending to can wait until the lockdown is over, we strongly recommend doing so.