Toyota Motor Corporation has announced it will reorganize its production system in Malaysia, given the gradual growth of the Malaysian market, with the creation of a new vehicle plant to serve as its production core in Malaysia.

UMW Toyota Motor Sdn. Bhd. (UMWT) will proceed with this reorganization through its subsidiary, Assembly Services Sdn. Bhd. (ASSB), a manufacturing company based in Malaysia. UMWT will discontinue the manufacturing of passenger vehicles at its existing plant by early 2019, using that location instead as a dedicated commercial vehicle plant as the new plant will exclusively manufacture passenger vehicles, according to the automaker.

Set to be built in Klang, in the state of Selangor, the new plant will have an annual production capacity of 50,000 vehicles. Approximately 49 billion yen (USD$443.8 million) is to be invested in the exclusive passenger vehicle manufacturing plant, which is planned to begin operations in early 2019. This plant is the next step in Toyota’s efforts to create competitive plants using innovative production technologies such as freely extensible lines and compact painting booths; features that will also be introduced in Toyota’s new Mexican plant and new Chinese line, according to the automaker.

As for the existing Malaysian plant started Corona and Corolla’s Complete Knock Down production in 1968, by dividing production of commercial and passenger vehicles between the existing plant and the new, processes and distribution will be optimized based on vehicle structure and size, which, in turn, will increase productivity in the existing plant, according to the automaker.