Total team coverage including former Alphavillain, the FT's man in Japan, David Keohane.
An extensive piece from the Financial Times, February 25:
Japanese automaker’s stance on limited appetite for fully electric vehicles is being reassessed
After spending the past decade as the car industry’s loudest champions of hybrid vehicles, Toyota executives could be forgiven for feeling some measure of vindication.
The Japanese carmaker’s dogged determination to pour billions into hybrid vehicles that combine batteries with the traditional internal combustion engine drew criticism from investors and environmentalists alike.
Consumers would balk at buying more expensive fully electric cars, Toyota repeatedly warned. Now, as a combination of stubbornly high prices and concern over inadequate charging infrastructure chills enthusiasm for battery electric vehicles (BEVs) in markets from Europe to the US, what was once regarded as heresy from Toyota is being reassessed.
Adam Jonas, an analyst at Morgan Stanley who confidently predicted that aggressive government regulation and a consumer preference for fully electric models would quickly extinguish the hybrid market, this month admitted: “I owe Toyota an apology.”
While demand for BEVs has risen over the past three years, according to data compiled by Jato Dynamics, their share of the new car market shrank in the UK and sales growth slowed in the US and Europe.
The shift in the market has already strengthened Toyota’s bottom line: sales of hybrids at the world’s largest carmaker climbed by almost 1mn to 3.4mn last year, helping the company raise its forecast for operating profit to a record ¥4.9tn ($33bn) for the year to March.Hybrids come in several varieties. Plug-in hybrids, or PHEVs, can run for dozens of miles on electric power alone and be charged at home, though their large battery means they are generally expensive. Full hybrids combine a smaller battery and a traditional engine that run together, making them cheaper both to buy and run.
The majority of the industry still believes that developing profitable BEVs is the most important long-term goal for carmakers, but the mini-renaissance of hybrids is forcing some to change their plans. In a US hybrid market mainly dominated by Toyota, Honda and the South Korean duo of Kia and Hyundai, domestic manufacturers are racing to catch up.
Last month General Motors, which had largely phased out plug-in hybrids from its range, said it would reintroduce the technology as it acknowledged that customers were taking longer than expected to embrace fully electric models.
Ford, which bet on hybrids as an interim technology, predicts its sales of such models will surge 40 per cent this year, double last year’s pace. It sold more than 52,000 Maverick pick-up trucks in 2023, making it the fifth best-selling hybrid in the US after models from Toyota and Honda....
....MUCH MORE + 276 comments.
