Located on nine hectares of land within the 94-hectare Surya Cipta Industrial Estate in the West Java district of Karawang, the car assembly plant looks imposing. The plant, the fifth such facility built by Astra Daihatsu Motor in Indonesia, includes a research and development center and a test drive area.

The newly-built facility is technologically more advanced than Daihatsu's assembly plant at Sunter in North Jakarta. "It's similar to the one o