General Motors to Invest $150 Million at Indonesian Plant

General Motors continues its expansion into Asia announcing a $150 million investment at its idled West Java, Indonesia, manufacturing operation to build a new line of passenger vehicles beginning in 2013.

GM says it will reactivate the 27-acre (11 ha) Bekasi facility to produce up to 400,000 “people movers” annually for sale in Southeast Asia.

No further details on the vehicle are available. The move will create about 800 jobs.

“This is one of the most significant undertakings we have made in the region,” Martin Apfel, president-GM Southeast Asia, says in a statement.

Apfel calls the reopening of Bekasi “an extension of GM’s commitment to maintain a strong manufacturing base in Indonesia and Southeast Asia.”

The plan includes pledges to leverage a local supply base and expand the auto maker’s dealer network there.

GM also operates manufacturing facilities in Thailand and Vietnam, two sites also targeted as drivers in its push to expand in the region.

The auto maker says it sold 4,500 vehicles in Indonesia last year, a market that saw total deliveries in 2010 of 764,710 light and commercial vehicles, according to Ward’s data.

Just five years ago, the country’s annual sales were half that number.