Thailand's car retailer Master Group Corporation (Asia) is opening new businesses and strengthening existing ones in preparation for tougher competition once the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) kicks off in 2015.

The country's leading retailer of integrated automobile businesses plans to raise combined annual sales revenue to THB15 billion (USD484.5 million) by 2015 from last year's THB8.5b, up by 28 percent from 2010.

"We're ready for ASEAN-wide retail automobile operations after studying the AEC and spending three years planning our strategies to cope with regional competition," said managing director Sunhavut Thamchuanviriya.