Vehicle Regulation, Bus Transport Services and Carriages and Automotive Industries State Minister Dilum Amunugama said recently that the Government will give priority to the provision of all facilities to local companies related to the transport sector which generate employment opportunities and bring huge foreign exchange to the country.
The Minister made these remarks during an inspection tour at the Autogroup International (Pvt) Ltd in Kaduwela recently. The company is engaged in conversion and re-manufacturing of high-value American vehicles from left to right-hand drive. Autogroup International is a fully-Australian-owned BOI approved company specialized in automobile conversion with offices in Dallas, USA and Melbourne, Australia. At present, the company exports left to right-hand drive converted vehicles to countries such as India, the United Kingdom, Indonesia, South Africa and Malaysia while 90 percent of the company’s output goes to Australia.
“A skilled workforce and a highly qualified engineering team of the company are engaged in converting vehicles imported from the USA which involves a lot of planning, Research and Development, new manufacturing processes such as 3D printing and new ideas. The expertise of local engineers is highly commendable and if our country has such a talented workforce, even we can manufacture new vehicles locally,” the Minister said.
“Therefore, we must provide more facilities to encourage such companies in order to bring more foreign exchange and generate employment opportunities,” he added.
