Applied Engineering's Malaysian venture to go live in April
Applied Engineering Technology (M), also known as AETM, has held a grand opening ceremony for its new manufacturing plant in Batu Kawan Industrial Park, Pulau Pinang in Malaysia.
During the summer of 2021 it was announces that US-based Applied Engineering (AE) would set up a joint venture plant with Malaysian counterpart, QES Manufacturing. The JV company would focus on providing electromechanical contract manufacturing services, from prototyping to high volume production – and thus Applied Engineering Technology (M) or AETM was born. Worth pointing out is that AETM is AE’s first offshore operation outside of the United States.
On March 9, 2022 a grand opening ceremony for the 20,000 square feet manufacturing plant in Batu Kawan was held, MIDA – the Malaysian investment promotion and development agency reports in a press release.
“We truly appreciate the partnership with QES. We will work in the best way possible to ensure the success of this joint venture. Batu Kawan is a great place for manufacturing companies, and we are glad to be able to cement a mark in this area. The markets served under this endeavour include semiconductor/display capital equipment, medical technology, industrial automation, aerospace, and emerging technology. We are confident that the ASEAN market will benefit from this partnership,” Jack Yao, president of Applied Engineering, says in the press release.
The Batu Kawan manufacturing plant, – which has a factory floor space of 20,000 square feet – is expected to start servicing customers in April 2022. At the moment, AETM has successfully obtained MIDA’s manufacturing licence as well as business licence from the local authority. The JV has also received a Manufacturing Warehouse Licence (LMW) in February 2022.
Managing Director and president of QES Group, Berhad Chew Ne Weng, says in the press release that, aside from the manufacturing facility, the JV has invested heavily in talent building.
”From November 2021 to January 2022, we have sent key staff members and technicians to AE San Jose for knowledge transfer, to have an in-depth understanding on the technical know-how. In addition, we intend to station technical experts from AE San Jose in Penang for additional training. For the first two years, our focus is to support our customers in terms of equipment assembly and integration, focusing on semiconductor, medical and other industry segments. Starting from the third year onwards, we plan to develop equipment design capability for our customers, based on their needs,” Berhad Chew Ne Weng explains.
