Sucheera Pinijparakarn
The Nation December 3, 2012 1:00 am
The company will go after successful executives aged under 30 in line with its study that showed that those young professionals prefer comfort, flexibility, individual lifestyles and firm financial status, he said.
Its loan portfolio of Bt14 billion represents mostly individuals and SMEs, while multinational corporations (MNCs) account for less than 3 per cent. The share of corporate customers is set to jump to 10 per cent next year.
The company earlier aimed at capturing individuals and SMEs, but it realised that segmentation is important for developing financial programmes and growing its portfolio.
MNCs are expected to move towards investing in Asean especially in Thailand because it is the best transit country for foreign businesses looking to expand in the region. Thailand is a country that welcomes investment, while Asean is in the spotlight of many European countries that want to build their business amid the economic slowdown in the eurozone.
More Japanese companies are expected to come here after they experienced that investing in China was uncomfortable for them.
Marketing activities will be aggressive next year, when the company will promote financial lease programmes to MNCs through associations such as the German-Thai Chamber of Commerce. It will also rope in
Japanese companies that are not involved with the automobile industry.
Besides their investing, MNCs are interesting because of their policy of giving car allowances ranging from Bt60,000 to Bt100,000 per month to their executives.
"We will chase companies with an allowance budget of Bt60,000-Bt70,000 because current financial programmes such as SmartDrive, which was introduced in the first half of this year, will draw MNCs from Europe and Japan," he said.
SmartDrive is a leasing scheme for corporate customers wanting to qualify for tax benefits with flexibility in the form of instalment plans and a chance to change to a newer vehicle at the end of the term.
The programme was popular in Europe, where this kind of financial lease is 40-50 per cent of the loan portfolio.
In Thailand, customers still prefer vehicle ownership rather than trading up to a newer vehicle, but the new generation, especially younger executives or executives who graduated abroad, will play a role in changing the market.
Financial programmes like SmartDrive in Thailand will grow more popular in five years. SmartDrive will increase to 30-40 per cent of the loan portfolio in five to seven years from 5-10 per cent this year.
The stable interest rate is a positive factor for leasing companies and Mercedes expects its loan portfolio will be at least 15 per cent bigger next year, he added.
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Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/business/Mercedes-Benz-Leasing-eyes-MNCs-30195461.html
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