Proton Is Gearing Up Its Network Ahead Of SUV Launch
Since Geely’s acquisition of 49.9% of the company, Proton has been kept busy with reorganising its operations, including bringing in experienced talent from the automotive industry. As after-sales is just as important as sales, the new management team of Proton wasted no time in making improvements. Centred around uplifting its brand value, Proton aims to have 109 3S/4S centres as part of its 180-degree approach in fulfilling customer satisfaction and ownership experience. This is also to prepare its sales and service network for the first Proton SUV, a premium segment offering which will be coming in the fourth quarter of 2018.
Within three months of the company announcing its incentive scheme to dealers to upgrade as well as to recruit new 3S/4S dealers, Proton had received 170 applications for this scheme. So far, 66 applications have been evaluated and approved while the rest are in the process of evaluation. The company is confident of reaching its targeted upgrades for 2018 in time for the new SUV launch. And beyond that, Proton has another phase of upgrades until 2020.
One of Proton’s major initiatives is the enhancement the overall product quality of the current range of Proton models. The adoption of Geely’s product quality audit scoring system, which was derived from the system used by Volvo Cars, has helped to identify issues and resulted in a strengthening of audit scores across all models. More initiatives can be expected this year, according to the company, as it strives to build cars of better quality to match other global manufacturers.
We are aware that all this looks good on paper, but the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Thus, the impending launch of its first SUV will serve as a litmus test for Proton where quality of product, sales and after-sales are concerned. It will not be surprising that everyone in Proton is sprouting some gray hair, or losing it.
The upcoming Proton SUV is touted to have very up-to-date features such as smart voice recognition, 360-degree 3D camera, adaptive cruise control and automatic emergency brake assist, just to name a few.
Proton has been busy building interest in the yet-to-be-named SUV (there’s a contest for this) by sending out test models to selected Proton dealerships and vendors for the public to get a closer look.
