In a statement, Asia Mobility said an open tender in the appointment process for the Selangor Mobility programme, a “highly specialised new service”, would have created a monopoly in the state.
“This would have stifled competitiveness and robbed the state of the opportunity to pilot the service in a real-world setting and assess the service providers’ performance over a reasonable period of time,” it said.
Questions arose on the possibility of preferential treatment in the tender process following revelations that Asia Mobility CEO Ramachandran Muniandy is the husband of youth and sports minister Hannah Yeoh.
Asia Mobility was one of two companies selected for the DRT service to provide first- and last-mile public transport services within the state.
On Friday, Selangor investment, trade and mobility committee chairman Ng Sze Han said the two companies – Asia Mobility and Badan Bas Coach – were selected to run the system after a presentation to the state transport committee and based on their experience in rolling out their proof of concept.
Asia Mobility said that as a pioneer of DRT in Malaysia with its Trek Rides app, the company had conducted a private pilot of the service in Petaling Jaya in September 2021 for the relevant stakeholders and clients, which it claimed was widely reported at the time.
The company said it was the first to be licensed by the Land Public Transport Agency to operate a “bus-on-demand” service in December 2022, and that it remained the only company with a made-in-Malaysia system designed and developed as part of its Trek platform.
Asia Mobility also noted that the appointment was only for a period of nine months.
“We regularly bid for tenders and, like any other competitive business, we are successful with some and not so successful with others.
“Being a highly transparent and ethical business which is an extension of the personal values of our co-founders, we abhor collusion and anti-competitive practices by any party, especially government agencies and corporates,” it said.
The company also said that it took the recent accusations seriously and would exercise its legal options, calling the allegations an “unsubstantiated attack against a Malaysian technology start-up”.
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