What are they up to in Japan with electric cars
After Toyota and Honda, Mazda has finally unveiled plans for the electrification of the range. However, the big Japanese manufacturers remain faithful to internal combustion engines. Meanwhile, in Japan there are plans to tax electric cars just like diesel and petrol
Over ten billion six hundred thousand dollars: these are the ones that the Japanese Mazda Motor Corp intends to put on the plate for the electrification of its vehicles, leaving the… door open to the possibility of entering as a player in the production of batteries. Until now, the main brands in Japan have been very lukewarm towards the electric car (preferring rather to concentrate on hydrogen ), this despite the double supremacy of Toyota and Nissan (Prius among the hybrids, Leaf among the electrics) suggesting that the Sol Levante would have rushed to embrace such technology, as has neighboring China. Instead, thanks to the silence of the government (which, as we will see, is even thinking of taxing cars on tap), the decision to proceed with the electrification of the range fell on individual homes.
Hence the extreme slowness with which the biggest brands presented their green industrial plans: after Toyota and Honda (criticized by environmentalists for their lack of enthusiasm), only Mazda was missing, which for its part tried to catch up by announcing to have raised its electric vehicle (EV) sales target to 40% of total global sales by 2030. But, just like Toyota (see also: For Toyota, the USA is not ready for electric mobility ), Mazda too will continue to look at endothermic engines. CEO Akira Marumoto said the company will look to introduce a new hybrid system and improve the efficiency of internal combustion powertrains. “We believe a multi-solution approach will be effective,” he said.
WHAT MAZDA'S INDUSTRIAL PLAN PROVIDES FOR
On the EV front, the automaker said it has agreed to partner with seven companies, including electrical components maker Rohm Co, to jointly develop and manufacture electric propulsion units. Company executives also said Mazda has reached a supply deal with battery maker Envision AESC for a limited period between 2025 and 2027.
“We will promote the full rollout of battery electric vehicles and consider investing in battery production. We estimate that the share of EVs in Mazda's global sales will rise to a range of 25% to 40% by 2030,” the company said in a statement. As part of a three-phase plan, Mazda said it will introduce battery-electric vehicle models in the "second half of phase 2," identified as the period between 2025 and 2027. The company has planned a rollout on scale of all-electric vehicles between 2028 and 2030.
Akira Koga , director and senior managing executive officer, told reporters that the 1.5 trillion yen investment will be made jointly with its partners and will be used for research and development. The news was first reported by business newspaper Nikkei . Koga declined to provide a detailed timeline for the investment, adding it would depend on how fast EVs are becoming more widespread. “Beyond that, we would like to develop a step-by-step strategy for battery procurement and insurance,” Koga said, hinting at the brand's entry into the industry.
CARLYLE GROUP BETS ON THE TSUNAMI OF THE EV CAR
Furthermore, the US private equity company Carlyle Group Inc. is betting on mobility on tap from Japan, at least according to what Reiji Terasaka , head of the Japanese branch, told Reuters : “They are thinking in a very innovative way about what they can do, and this it's creating a lot of (investment) opportunities for private equity,” Terasaka said, pointing to Carlyle's global business networks that portfolio companies could tap into to find potential partners overseas.
The US player expects a tsunami in the automotive supply chain with the transition to electric vehicles which, requiring fewer components but extremely diversified skills, such as software engineering, will probably overturn Japan's main industry, stratified and unchanged from the post-war period to today. Hence a greater possibility of penetration of foreign players. Carlyle has already announced a 38 billion yen ($270.75 million) takeover bid for Totoku Electric Co Ltd, a power cable maker whose products include harnesses for automobile seat heaters.
DOES JAPAN TAX ELECTRIC CARS?
All this while the Japanese government is evaluating the possibility of reformulating the delicate balance of car taxes which can go up to 110,000 yen (or about 760 euros), with a special regime set at 25,000 yen for battery or hydrogen vehicles . On the basis of the principle that the more polluted, the more I pay, in fact, even in Japan those who drive cars with larger engines are subject to higher taxation: however, this does not apply to electric cars.
After all, if those who have V8 or V6 supercars today scrapped them to switch to the EV equivalent, the loss of revenue for the state would be significant, which is why the government is thinking of replicating the same model for taxes on diesel and petrol cars. thus taxing the electric ones based on the power of the engine.
The same decision has already been taken by London. UK Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt said the UK would reintroduce taxes on electric cars from 2025. Britain faces a £55bn hole it is “open” in UK public finances. Hence the need to prepare a broader project of tax increases and spending cuts.
THE LOST REVENUE AND THE PROPOSALS
Moreover, according to the official data examined by the various ministries working on the reformulation, with an estimated presence of electric cars at between 1% and 2% of sales in Japan, the revenue this year will already be 14% in less than the 2002 record. Money that will have to be found somewhere.
There are those who propose that the new vignette for electric cars be parameterized on the kilometers travelled, but in this way there is the risk of disadvantageing the middle class, which usually uses private means to get around, giving an advantage to the richest.
For this reason, a public debate on the subject is not excluded. However, the manufacturers point out that such a reform could now stop the purchase of electric cars, especially since the Japanese government, unlike the EU and partly the USA, has not yet formalized any roadmap for goodbye to internal combustion engines. generically set at 2035 but never definitively stamped.
THE US INFLATION ACT COOLED TOKYO – WASHINGTON RELATIONS
Remaining on the subject of the production of electric cars, Japan has recently intervened on the rules with a strong protectionist flavor contained in the Inflation Reduction Act wanted by US President Joe Biden to shield US industry from the boldness of electric vehicles arriving shortly from China .
Yasutoshi Nishimura , Japanese Industry Minister, the same one who is considering taxing draft cars just like diesel and petrol ones, met Gina Raimondo , US Commerce Secretary, to essentially tell her that the package would violate World Trade Organization rules (WTO). Therefore, even Japan, albeit with a greater delay, has aligned itself with the position held by Brussels and Seoul.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/smartcity/che-cosa-combinano-in-giappone-con-le-auto-elettriche/ on Fri, 09 Dec 2022 06:39:13 +0000.