Malaysian bus operator HI Mobility is betting on increased traffic at the Singapore border to drive growth as the company readies to start trading Friday after a rare listing by one of the country’s transport providers.
The company, which is the biggest cross-border bus operator in both countries, has raised 116 million ringgit ($35.11 million) in an initial public offering that values the firm at US$137 million ($183.52 million).
CEO Lim Chern Chuen is seeing a change in the profile of his customers and strong growth in its cross-border bus services between Malaysia’s Johor state and Singapore over the last few years.
While bus services were traditionally used by Malaysians going to work in Singapore, more people are traveling in the other direction to Johor, following the creation of a special economic zone, Lim said in an interview.
More than 300,000 people cross the border daily, making it one of the busiest land crossings in the world.
HI Mobility’s revenue rose 73% to 207.7 million ringgit in 2024 from the previous year, while gross profit more than doubled. It operates 155 buses on the Singapore-Johor route, around a quarter of its overall fleet.
Nearly half its revenue in 2024 came from Singapore. It also operates bus services in the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur and the states of Selangor and Melaka.
The company’s stock market debut is a rare success story in Malaysia’s public transport landscape, which is mostly dominated by closely-held state-linked firms.
Lim said that the company’s success in gaining profitability is in part due to its pursuit of automation to increase efficiency, and it is now also offering automation and technological solutions as a service to other operators.
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“If we look at mobility as a whole, that is where the market becomes even bigger, beyond just the buses we operate,” Lim said.
Founded in 2002 as Causeway Link by Lim’s father Lim Han Weng, the firm was the first Malaysian bus operator to win a cross-border service license.
The elder Lim also founded of Johor-based logistics firm Yinson Holdings, which has now transformed into an energy infrastructure firm with a market value of $1.4 billion.
Yinson is currently planning an IPO for its offshore floating production unit in the US.
HI Mobility’s IPO will make it the third-largest listing in Malaysia this year, where US$127 million has been raised so far — the most in Southeast Asia.
Malaysia’s stock market was also the region’s top IPO destination, hosting over $1.8 billion worth of IPOs.
