Former Alphavillain David Keohane along with Kana Inagaki, reporting from Tokyo.
From the Financial Times, July 20:
Japanese carmakers are “very scared” by the rapid development of Chinese electric vehicles and risk becoming “followers” if they cannot innovate more quickly, the head of Sony-Honda’s joint venture has warned.
Yasuhide Mizuno said Japan’s companies needed to change their conservative corporate culture and called for a breakthrough in manufacturing to keep up with Chinese rivals, which within a few years have become some of the world’s leading vehicle exporters.
“Chinese competitors are very strong, and I’m very scared of their implementation and execution speed,” said Mizuno, chief executive of Sony Honda Mobility, at the company’s headquarters in Tokyo.
“Japanese carmakers are a bit nervous or sensitive before launching a car. We need to change this kind of behaviour, otherwise China will be first and we will always be followers,” added Mizuno, who led Honda’s China operations until 2020.
Despite an ambitious target to phase out petrol cars by 2040, Honda has lagged behind rivals in the global race for electrification. It agreed to team up with Nissan in March to develop electric vehicles in order to survive the competition against high-tech, low-cost models from China.
The 50-50 joint venture between Honda and Sony was established in 2022 to combine Honda’s car manufacturing strength with Sony’s software and entertainment expertise. The company plans to start delivering its electric vehicle to North America by 2026.
Mizuno said Chinese competitors were moving faster than he had anticipated. Buoyed by large government subsidies and the recruitment of top Japanese, European and US engineers, the development time of Chinese electric vehicles — from concept to production — has shrunk to as little as 18 months, he estimated, adding that was less than half of the time it took to develop a car in Japan....
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Excellent insight. Some of the 126 comments are pretty sharp as well.
