Sime Tyres, Malaysia brand which own by Continental AG with 51% share.. Only left Fung Keong Rubber a.k.a FKR, Viva tire & Silverstone wholly own by Malaysian..

Sad though. As a country that produces rubber, this is sad to see other countries succeeding but we cannot even keep up.

the main culprit lies on ourselves, more specifically, the trade bodies overseeing rubber/palm oil. Too senang syiok sendiri keep thinking that petik straight from the tree with minimal processing, then get money.

Didn't think further into the future and invest in R&D to develop better uses/better processes. Take for example, if really manage to find an innovative way to drastically improve the durability of rubber and flexibility of moulding it, with the resurgence of environmental sustainability awareness, rubber based plastic could've made a huge comeback precisely because it is from sustainable sources.

Same also for palm oil. No reason that south america use sugar cane to derive ethanol, when palm oil can produce much more volume of biodiesel per hectar of land. If go back 20 years, if MARDI really do their diligent job of R&D, who knows malaysia is the hub for biofuel from palm oil, instead of now merely for cooking and some consumer product stabalisation additives. Only recent 2 years that there is promotion of the benefits of plam based tocotrienols. Kind of too late as the perception of palm plantation is already ruined by the western counterparts.

We have plenty of rubber but lacking seriously in Engineering & Technology.