Jibuhin Bakrie opens new plant in W. Java

JAKARTA (JP): PT Bakrie & Brothers' joint venture PT Jibuhin Bakrie Indonesia opened its US$29 million automotive-component plant in Karawang, West Java, yesterday.

The plant, officially opened by Director General for Steel Machine and Chemical Industries Effendi Sudarsono, will produce power train components such as ring gears, yokes and rocker arm and final drive assemblies.

PT Bakrie Tosanjaya, an automotive-component subsidiary of Bakrie & Brothers, owns 40 percent of PT Jibuhin Bakrie and Jidosha Buhin Kogyo of Japan owns 60 percent.

Jibuhin Bakrie will initially focus on making ring gear with an annual capacity of 720,000 units. It expects to export 50 percent of these to Japan and sell the rest locally.

The company then plans to produce 250,000 yoke and rocker arm assemblies yearly.

"We plan to double our automotive component capacity with an additional investment of more than $20 million," Bakrie president Tanri Abeng said after the opening.

The Bakrie & Brothers group plans to open an automobile plant to produce multi-purpose vans.

Tanri said the heavily-protected automobile industry had been slow to respond to the challenges and opportunities brought about by globalization.

The government must support the local car-component industry to reduce the country's dependence on imports, Tanri said.

Joint ventures with foreign manufacturers are the quickest and most effective way to develop the domestic component industry, he said.

Effendi said the country's automotive-component imports increased to $3.04 billion in 1995 from $2.78 billion in 1994, while its automotive-component exports rose to $139.7 million from $93 million.

There are about 160 automotive-component manufacturers in the country making at least 50 kinds of component ranging from power trains to chassis and bodies, he said.

He predicted the value of the country's automotive-component production would rise 22 percent to $1.42 billion this year from $1.16 billion last year. (06)