What cars are made in the Philippines?
It is not unknown that the majority of cars roaming our streets in the Philippines today are imported from other countries. Sometime ago, a lot of different vehicles were assembled in our country. In fact, Honda just recently stopped production in their Santa Rosa, Laguna factory. While having lots of cars being manufactured locally is no longer the case today, there are still a good number of cars both made from scratch and assembled here.
What exactly are those? Here they are arranged alphabetically by brand.
Foton Philippines
Foton is one of the more recent companies to set up an assembly plant in the Philippines, just starting in 2016. While most car assembly plants can be found in Santa Rosa, Laguna, Foton’s can be found in Clark Freeport, Pampanga.
They haven’t been doing this for a long time but they do have one of the widest number of models assembled here. There’s seven to be exact. Those are the Foton Toplander, Thunder, and Traveller for passenger vehicles, and the Tornado, to name one of the trucks. These are completely knocked-down kits or CKD. The vehicles’ different parts are imported from outside the country then assembled in the local factory.
Hyundai Asia Resources Inc.
Hyundai is the latest company to set up an assembly plant in the Philippines. They started in 2017. The plant assembles the Hyundai Eon subcompact hatchback, and the H350 passenger van. The Eon was originally imported from India while the H350 started local assembly upon its launch in the market.
Isuzu Philippines
Isuzu Philippines has been manufacturing in the Philippines for a long time. While they ended local assembly of the D-Max a few years ago, they still assemble trucks such as the F and N-series, and different versions of the modernized jeepney.
Mitsubishi Motors Philippines
Mitsubishi has also long been into car manufacturing in the Philippines. They currently manufacture vehicles at their Santa Rosa, Laguna plant. The plant used to be Ford’s Philippine factory and was sold when they stopped local production. Today, the plant manufactures the Mirage hatchback, Mirage G4 sedan, and L300 van.
As of writing, it is not yet known when and if the updated Mirage and Mirage G4 will begin manufacturing in the country.
Nissan Philippines, Inc.
Just like the other brands, Nissan also used to manufacture a lot of models in the country. Today the Almera is the only model manufactured in their Santa Rosa plant. The current Almera is manufactured completely from the ground up. There are reports that the plant may soon close down but there are also other reports that manufacturing will be reduced to assembly of CKD kits. That also means the next generation Nissan Almera may soon be coming to the Philippines.
Toyota Motor Philippines
Toyota’s are not hard to find among the best-selling cars in the Philippines. In fact in 2019, seven of their models made it into the top-10 best selling cars in the country with 4 in the top-5. Two of those are also locally made.
TMP currently manufactures the top-selling Vios subcompact sedan and Innova MPV from the ground up. Both models have been manufactured in their Santa Rosa factory since their first generations were launched many years ago. The Vios is currently in its third-generation while the Innova is in its second.
Photos from various sources.
