(March 22): It has been confirmed that China’s Geely Automobile Holdings has withdrawn its bid to buy a controlling stake in Malaysian carmaker Proton.

According to South China Morning Post (SCMP), Geely’s president, An Conghui, did not elaborate on the reasons for the decision to withdraw the bid, but Li Shufu, its chairman, had said in an interview with Bloomberg earlier this month that the Malaysian company kept changing its mind.

On March 3, Li told Bloomberg: “They keep changing, today it’s this, tomorrow it’s that. They haven’t decided what they want.”

Geely, the owner of the Swedish Volvo brand, earlier on Wednesday reported better-than-expected earnings for 2016, as net profit surged by 126 per cent to 5.1 billion yuan (US$739 million).

It had been considered the favourite to acquire a controlling stake in Proton, Malaysia’s largest carmaker which also owns the Lotus sports car marque, though Europe’s second-largest carmaker Groupe PSA, which owns the Citroen, Peugeot, and DS brands, was also in the running, SCMP reported.

The successful bidder would get access to Proton’s Tanjung Malim assembly plant, which has an annual production capacity of 150,000 vehicles.

The owner of Proton would also qualify to ship vehicles tax-free among the 10 member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Geely’s main aim was to expand its footprint into Southeast Asia, said Robin Zhu, a Hong Kong-based auto analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein, when the news of Geely’s withdrawal of interest in Proton broke. Last month it announced a 2017 sales target of 1 million vehicles, an increase of 34 per cent from last year. It has been actively seeking overseas acquisitions, Hong Kong-based executive director Lawrence Ang told SCMP earlier this month.

Proton is looking for a strategic foreign partner as part of conditions it agreed to when it received a loan of RM1.5 billion from the Malaysian government last year.

The firm, once one of the Malaysia’s flagship companies, has been struggling with losing market share in Malaysia while failing to compete overseas, SCMP reported.