PT Blue Bird Tbk (BIRD) has spent IDR300 million towards the purchasing of 800 units of vehicles and planning to acquire between 4,000 and 5,000 units until the end of 2022. From that figure, between 75 and 100 of them are electric vehicles for the G20 Summit in Bali in November.
Blue Bird is a transportation company established in 1972 famous for its taxi service in Jakarta. The company also has businesses in other sector through its multiple subsidiaries of:
- Regular taxis (Blue Bird & Pusaka)
- Executive taxis (Silver Bird)
- Limousines and car rentals (Golden Bird)
- Chartered bus (Big Bird)
- Logistics (Iron Bird Logistic)
- Industry (Restu Ibu Pusaka – bus body manufacturing and Pusaka Niaga Indonesia)
- Property (Holiday Resort Lombok and Pusaka Bumi Mutiara)
- IT and supporting services (Hermis Consulting – IT SAP, Pusaka Integrasi Mandiri – EDC, Pusaka GPS, Pusaka Buana Utama – fuel station, Pusaka Bersatu – lubricant, Pusaka Sukucadang Indonesia – spare parts) and
- Heavy equipment (Pusaka Andalan Perkasa and Pusaka Bumi Transportasi).
Blue Bird also operates in other big cities in Indonesia such as Surabaya, Bandung, Semarang, Medan, Pekanbaru, Palembang, Bangka Belitung, Batam, Banten, Manado and Makassar as well as business and tourism spots across Indonesia such as Bali, Lombok and Yogyakarta.
Deputy Director Adrianto Djokosoetono explained that the company would allocate between IDR50 billion and IDR75 billion to purchase 75-100 electric vehicles (EV). The EV purchase was made due to Blue Bird’s participation as a vehicle provider during the G20 Summit.
On top of acquiring new vehicles, BIRD will also revitalize its taxi pools in several places following the arrival of new cars. The revitalization is also related to the addition of a new revenue line from the pool rental business as warehousing for courier services.
“We will continue to [acquire] according to deliveries from our suppliers. Hopefully, there will be no delays so we can accelerate the fulfillment of 5,000 cars until the end of 2022. If not, we can still achieve purchasing 4,000 units,” Djokosoetono said on August 8, 2022.
The IDR1.2 trillion Capex came from internal cash, President Director Sigit Priawan Djokosoetono said. He believed the Capex allocation was the right thing to do since the year 2022 would be a turning point for the economy to grow after being hit by the COVID-19 pandemic in the past two years.
Blue Bird was upbeat that transportation business would recover after the pandemic. However, tourism bus business might still be restrained from the pandemic effect. Sigit Djokosoetono also mentioned the hampered supply of EV due to geopolitical conditions, in which this might hinder the rising trend of sustainable transportation globally.
