KUALA LUMPUR: UEM Group has pledged to develop 40 more Bumiputera vendors between 2017 and 2020.
This is part of the Bumiputera Vendors Development Programme (VDP) it signed with the International Trade and Industry Trade Ministry (MITI).
UEM Group Chairman Tan Sri Dr Ahmad Tajuddin Ali announced this at the company’s 50th Anniversary Stakeholders Appreciation Dinner, which was attended by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak yesterday.
In 2014 UEM Group signed a memorandum of understanding with MITI, the anchor company entrusted with providing opportunities to develop Bumiputera vendors in the property development, expressway and facilities maintenance sectors.
Ahmad Tajuddin said the company had long been supportive of Bumiputera vendors where more than RM5 billion worth of contracts have been awarded by UEM Group and its subsidiaries from 2011 to 2016.
“We don’t only provide business opportunities to these vendors but we also hold them to the highest standards of performance like business excellence initiative thus creating truly global players.
“The results are already starting to show with three Bumiputera companies under our guidance recently making it to the final round of the Industry Excellence Awards organised by MITI.
“We help them build their competencies organically thus enabling them to move from the relatively lower value areas of the supply chain such as planning, design and maintenance to the relatively higher values area such as procurement, supply, construction and development,” he said in his speech.
Also present at the dinner was UEM Group Group Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Datuk Izzaddin Idris.
Izzaddin said while the company will continue to tap into the vast opportunities available in Malaysia, it will also be expanding its overseas presence in neighbouring countries.
“Indonesia is a country where infrastructure is in demand and highways being one of them. Following the opening of our 116km Cikopo-Palimanan toll road in Indonesia in June 2015, we have developed and proposed new alignments to the government of Indonesia as well as participated in several of their tenders.
“In Australia, the launch of UEM Sunrise’s two property projects, Aurora Central Melbourne and Conservatory received overwhelming response, and there’s a strong demand for asset and facility management services in Singapore, Taiwan and the Middle East,” he said.
He added that even with several industry-wide challenges, its subsidiaries have and will continue to face, a majority of them have progressed promisingly over the years and as the majority shareholder, UEM Group will continue to play a strategic role in strengthening their operations and growing their businesses.