Foreign firms marketing practices vis-a-vis support rendered by host government agencies: a case study in Malacca Industrial Estates / Sharifah Saleha Syed Abdul Kadir

Foreign firms are an engine of growth of our economy. The foreign firms are expected to provide the important stimulation to expedite the nations industrialization process to achieves Vision 2020: wherein by the year 2020 Malaysia is expected to become fully- industrialized nation like its other Asian counterparts such as Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. Malacca has set a vision to turn the state to be Tully Industrialized State” by the year 2010. A key success of the company can be measured by the effectiveness of their marketing strategy, which consists of marketing segmentation, marketing targeting and marketing positioning. Marketing is importance in order to identifying market opportunities; consumer behaviour and customers’ needs and want. The implementation of marketing by local and foreign firms is importance to identify marketing program, market sales potential, new market o[opportunities, sales forecasting, creating advertising and promotional plans, developing distribution plans, budgeting, promotion and advertising tools in other to ensure the successful of their performance in the market Today’s business organizations use market research in the stage decision making process to analyze market potential, market share, sales, business trends and competition. Thus, the study explore the marketing practices by foreign firms in Malacca Industrial Estates and supporting agencies that may enhance the future growth of this industry. Data from the survey of MIDP, which covers from the year 1995-1999 of 40 foreign firms, were used using regression and t-test. The lists of the firms were drawn from Malacca SEDC and FMM.