M Group has grown to be one of the largest high-tech plastics manufacturer in Malaysia and has operations in both Malaysia and Indonesia
Frequently, people associate M Group with "property development" as our track record and building presence all across Malaysia points evidently towards that. But many do not know that M Group actually started as a plastic trading business back in the 1960s. Today, M Group has grown to be one of the largest high-tech plastics manufacturer in Malaysia and has operations in both Malaysia and Indonesia. The Malaysian portion is undertaken by the wholly-owned subsidiary M Group Plastics Industries Sdn Bhd (MSPI), while the Indonesian operation comes under a 65%-owned unit P.T. M Group Indonesia.
In 1965, M Group Group Founder Tan Sri Dato' Sri Leong's father founded M Group as a plastic trading company and at that point Tan Sri Leong was helping out in the business. He initially aspired to become an engineer but was persuaded by his father to take up training in "plastics technology" in Japan to help further expand the family's business.
At the tender age of 22, his father handed over the reins of leadership along with a small seed capital for Tan Sri Leong to begin work on a manufacturing plant and to expand his business which was already clocking in millions of ringgit in revenue a year. His main objective of wanting to start his own manufacturing plant was to be able to effectively manage its costs, and in the long term, to get the company listed.
From its humble beginnings of a small shop lot with just 3 machines in Jalan Imbi, to a larger rented factory in Segambut, the business expanded rapidly. At the time, Tan Sri Leong had already begun dealing with many Japanese electrical and electronics giants along with concurrently expanding on his machine capacity. He bought the first 7 acres of land from PKNS in 1989. He felt the move was necessary as many Japanese, Korean and American companies were moving their operations to Malaysia from their home countries to capitalise on the lower cost of doing business. The countries that benefited from this the most were those in the South East Asian region like Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.
In December 1992, Tan Sri Leong listed M Group on the second board of the KLSE. MSPI was the first company in Malaysia to own a 4,000 tonnes clamping force machine which was the biggest in ASEAN at the time. By 1995, Tan Sri Leong had opened his first overseas factory in Indonesia, followed by a second in the year 2011.
Approximately 40% of the Malaysian plastics' operational sales and revenue are from export, with the top 5 export markets being Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam and Philippines. The Malaysian factory focuses primarily on proprietary products, especially material handling products. As for the Indonesian operations, P.T. M Group Indonesia is one of the biggest player in the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) market focusing on large automotive parts in Indonesia.
MSPI has grown to become a trusted supplier of durable and high quality products i.e. a wide range of plastic products including industrial containers, furniture, motorcycle safety helmets, and many more. Being a market leader in manufacturing plastic pallets, MSPI offers a range of pallets suitable for a wide range of use including in the food and beverage, electronic and electrical, chemical and pharmaceutical, paper and printing industries. Apart from being cost effective, the pallets are light-weight, safe and rather easy to handle.
Another popular range of products include multi-purpose industrial plastic containers. These are suitable for industrial, food and beverage, agriculture, fishery, poultry, household and wholesale distribution use.