The Asian Economic Crisis of 1998 almost derailed the project completely, due to a huge increase in the price of the Japanese-built imported trains caused by the devaluation of the Malaysian Ringgit, forcing the government to look at alternative solutions.

In 1998, the decision was made to cancel plans to import Japanese trains and to produce them locally instead.

[8] Scomi Rail's main monorail manufacturing plant is the ISO 9001 certified Engineering, Technology and Innovation Centre located at the Rawang Industrial Park, located 30 km from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's capital city.

The SUTRA is a highly customisable design, and is designed to accommodate 2 to 8 cars per set, with capacity ranging from 6,400 pphpd in the 4-car KL Monorail to 36,000 in the 5/6 car Line 17 (São Paulo Metro) and Manaus Monorail.

Currently, Generation 3 monorails (successor to the SUTRA) and MRT-type trains are under development by Scomi Rail as future products.

[10] Scomi Engineering won a RM1.84bil bid in 2008 to build a monorail project in Mumbai with its Indian partner Larsen & Toubro.