Thailand Made Fiestas Heading to Australia
Ford Motor Company has launched a new $500USD passenger car plant in southeast Thailand, which will raise its share of the small car segment in Asia.
According to Reuters the plant, which is also a joint venture with Mazda, the plant will produce over 100,000 Ford’s Fiesta and Mazda2 models a year and export 85% of them overseas.
Speaking to Reuters, David Alden, Ford’s president for southeast Asia and Japan said that its Fiestas will not only be exported throughout Asia, but also exported to New Zealand, Australia and South Africa.
“It is a pretty important strategic statement that we are making of the importance of ASEAN countries, with Thailand as its productino base”.
The production of the Fiesta will commence as early as 2010 and will preplace 1.4 to 1.6 litre engine variants which are imported from Colonge and Valencia.