KUALA LUMPUR: Public Investment Bank (PublicInvest) remains positive on DRB-Hicom Bhd growth strategy toward achieving a sales target of 310,000 and 500,000 units, by 2030 and 2035 respectively, for Proton.
Proton sold 141,000 units in 2022.
The research firm has maintained its outperform rating on the stock.
About 50 per cent of the sales target is to be new energy vehicles (NEV) and export market.
The ambitious target will be driven by its partnership with Geely and the development of the Automotive Hi-Tech Valley (AHTV) project which will transform Tanjung Malim into a global automotive hub for NEV, said the research firm.
AHTV is aimed at being the next generation automotive hub (e.g. Toyota City in Japan and Volkswagen City in Germany), which spans over 4,000 acres surrounding the PROTON Tanjung Malim plant.
It will cover extensive automotive and mobility solutions across the value chain, from technology research and development centre, to manufacturing cluster as well as supporting services and associated ecosystem, including logistics, research university, training and learning institutions within a smart city.
Proton is set to fully shift its Shah Alam operation to Tanjung Malim by 2026/27.
About 50 vendors are expected to move into the new facilities in AHTV within the next few years.
The AHTV is expected to attract some RM32 billion worth of investments over the next 10 years and expand the capability of local vendors towards specializing in high technology manufacturing.
"However, we keep our estimates unchanged for now as we are not expecting any near-term impact arising from this project. "We continue to like DRB-Hicom's growth prospects and retain our Outperform call with unchanged target price of RM2.10," it said in a note today.-ends-