The effects of an industry-wide bottleneck to fill backlogged orders – stemming from the pandemic – saw precious raw materials and parts supply dry up, getting in the way of car production. That invariably lead to super long wait times (a problem that still persists today), and at one point, getting a Perodua Alza was a 13-month long wait, for instance.

Over the past few months however, things have improved as 9- to 13-month waitlists have averaged down to around 2 to 8 months now across all models, in part due to the securing of precious semiconductors and parts supplies.

"Waiting period is now between 2 to 8 months, depending on model," said the Vice President of Perodua, Datuk Ahmad Suhaimi Hashim. "If we compare to before this, things have much improved," he said at the sidelines of the Japan Mobility Show 2023 (JMS 2023).

Part of this waitlist whittle comes from securing parts and semiconductors. However Perodua – like much of the industry – isn't completely out of the woods just yet regarding the latter, though improvements have been made.

"Unfortunately, Alza is one of the models [that are affected]. Though earlier this year, the situation was worse. But we managed to negotiate with suppliers for particular components, and to a certain extent, [they] managed to supply," Datuk Suhaimi explained to the media.

"We hope in the coming year the situation will be much improved," he said.

Perodua has been hitting a stride in their production, with them making circa 30,000 cars every month in the third quarter of 2023 across its plants. The company plans to manufacture 330,000 vehicles this year.