In late 2015, the Land Transportation Office (LTO) ran into some issues with the company manufacturing license plates for the Philippines, which was based in Europe. Because of this, the backlog for vehicle plates increased drastically, with some car owners having to wait over a year or more for their license plates. To address this, the LTO refurbished its own plate manufacturing facilities at their central office in Quezon City. By 2018, the facility was fully operational, printing the long-overdue license plates for cars registered from late 2015 all the way up to present. But changing manufacturers meant having to slightly upgrade the format. These upgrades included:
- FE-Schrift typeface (as seen in German plates)
- QR code on the lower right corner containing the vehicle's information such as make and model, color, year registered, etc.
- Region is no longer written on the bottom of the plate, but is now signified by the first letter
- Overall, a cleaner look compared to the older plate designs