The automotive industry is now buckling under the pressure of rising cost of raw materials and logistics, as well as shortage of semiconductor parts and labour. Since June, several manufacturers have already announced price hikes unrelated to the resumption of SST (though for ease of transition, the two factors are grouped into one price adjustment). Toyota for example, has already announced a circa RM 3,000 increase in prices of the Toyota Hilux, which as a commercial vehicle, never qualified f

Honda Japan has released a video on the 2021 Honda HR-V being subjected to performance tests on snow. In Japan, the all-new Honda HR-V (known as Vezel in Japan) is slated to go on sale in April. Powertrain options for the 2021 Honda HR-V include a 1.5-litre paired to a CVT, and a 1.5-litre petrol-electric e:HEV hybrid powertrain, similar to the one that powers the Honda City RS. All-wheel drive (AWD) option, Honda calls it Real Time AWD, is available for both powertrains. Real Time AWD system is

From affordable A-segment sedans to large D-segment saloons, let’s recap and a take a look at some of the most important car launches of 2020. Keep in mind that 2020 has been an unprecedented year, considering that the Covid-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on the entire economic sector, not just the automotive industry. 2020 Honda City (GN2, GN3) RM 74,191 - RM 86,561 Who can forget Honda Malaysia’s marketing campaign for the all-new 2020 Honda City back in August – one that fired shots at the Toyota

Proton is aiming to sell 4,000 units of its B-segment Proton X50 for 2020. The vehicle is yet to be launched and but bookings are now opened. The target set is rather conservative. Assuming that the model is launched in October, that gives Proton about 3 months to meet its 4,000 units target, which translates into an average monthly sales of around 1,330 units. For comparison, sales of the Proton X70 (locally-assembled CKD model) averaged around 1,800 units/month, with 12,732 units delivered as

At long last, Proton has released preliminary details of the highly-anticipated Proton X50 to selected members of the media. Here’s a quick low-down on what you need to know about this new SUV. What powertrain do we get? For starters, Proton will offer the X50 with two powertrain options. The first is a 1.5-litre multi-port injection (MPI) turbocharged three-cylinder (not four-cylinder as reported earlier, sorry) petrol engine that does 150 PS and 226 Nm, while the second is a slightly more soph

Is the upcoming Perodua D55L an A-segment or B-segment SUV. Is it even in the same segment as the Proton X50? The short answer is yes. Both the Proton X50 and the yet-to-be-named Perodua D55L are B-segment SUVs although many will insist that the latter sits in the A-segment, but they are not entirely wrong. Wait, what? We will explain more on that later. What is this ABC-format vehicle segment? Before we go further, we need to establish a few things. The Euro-style ABCD vehicle segmentation is c