KUALA LUMPUR (April 14): BMW Malaysia Sdn Bhd (BMW Group Malaysia) said today it has no plans to assemble more product lineups in Malaysia.

Currently, the German luxury car manufacturer assembles eight BMW models at its Kulim plant in Kedah.

"For every locally assembled unit, we need to have a business case. For example, there has to be available kits from our plant overseas for us to assemble them together into a vehicle in Malaysia. And then, the pricing consideration comes in," its head of corporate communications Sashi Ambi told theedgemarkets.com after the launch of the all-new Mini Countryman today.

Between January and March this year, BMW Group Malaysia, whose brands include BMW, Mini and Motorrad, sold 2,600 vehicles, a 17.6% increase from 2,210 a year ago.

The increase was attributed to the popularity of the BMW 3 Series plug-in hybrid and X5, which were launched in 2016, as well as the positive reception towards its Full Circle Programme financing scheme, which drove up the sales of the X1.

BMW Group Malaysia today launched the all-new Mini Countryman sports activity vehicle, which is imported from the Netherlands. The Mini Countryman comes in two variants, namely the Mini Cooper Countryman and Mini Cooper S Countryman.

The Mini Cooper Countryman is priced at RM239,888, while the Mini Cooper S Countryman carries a price tag of RM269,888, on-the-road without insurance.