Why is Toyota going all out on electric cars?
The sale of cars on tap slows down in the US and Europe, so brands postpone their models. And Toyota, always skeptical about electric cars, says “I told you so”…
While Mitsubishi escapes from China, abandoning the JV on cars on tap with the local partner Gac to take refuge in Ampere (Renault, with financing from Nissan) and the Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, Yasutoshi Nishimura , invites the USA and Europe to sit at the same table to create a large trilateral alliance on electric mobility to stop Beijing's advance, Toyota returns to focus on new technologies.
WIDESPREAD SKEPTICISM
Although Japan, thanks to Toyota's commitment to R&D, was a pioneer of electric technology years ago (just think of the Prius), in recent times its manufacturers, which in the country constitute a very powerful industrial lobby that is difficult to contain by politics, have preferred instead to focus on hydrogen .
This is also why there is widespread skepticism towards the electric car, especially where it is understood (as the EU does) as only the standard of the future. All this has led to a substantial wait-and-see attitude in the country towards mobility on tap.
TOYOTA LEADS THE ANTI-ELECTRIC CAR FRONT
And Toyota's CEO, Akio Toyoda , remains one of the most well-known detractors of electric mobility . Having him at the head of the automotive association of car manufacturers of the Land of the Rising Sun naturally did the rest.
Commenting on the decline in demand for electric cars during the Japan Mobility Show, he lashed out at the supporters of mobility on tap and, in particular, at all his detractors who criticize him for his intransigence on EVs: “People are finally starting to see things how are they"
NO ELECTRIC BETWEEN HONDA AND GM
Moreover, there is a drop in demand (even Tesla's latest quarterly report shows this) and in the last few hours it has led Toyota's compatriot rival, Honda, to tear up the partnership agreement with General Motors for the development of cars battery-powered “at an affordable price”.
An agreement that didn't even last a year and should have included the creation of compact crossovers assembled on the platform and equipped with the Detroit giant's Ultium batteries to arrive on the market in 2027 at prices below 30 thousand dollars.
For Honda's CEO, Toshihiro Mibe , the time has not yet come for economically sustainable projects aimed at developing "electric vehicles at affordable prices". While the American counterpart Mary Barra laconically said: “We are taking immediate measures to improve the profitability of our electric vehicle portfolio and adapt to the slowdown in short-term growth”, postponing the market launch and the start of production of the battery-powered variants of the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups.
And, precisely with reference to what is happening in the USA, Toyoda said: "There are many ways to climb the mountain of CO2 neutrality", then focusing on the role of the legislator: "If the rules are written in an ideological way, then they are it is consumers, normal people who suffer the most."
THE SLOWDOWN ALSO IN GERMANY
The decline was also sharp in Germany, where the incentives that had supported demand have just ended. This is confirmed by the recent statements of the Volkswagen Group's Sales Manager, Hildegard Wortmann , who admitted that bookings are "lower than targets due to a market trend below expectations".
And so Audi postpones production of the Q4 e-tron. While Mercedes-Benz: in the latest quarterly report, speaks of a "subdued market context, characterized by intense price competition, particularly in the electric vehicle segment", of "fairly limited growth in the world economy for the rest of the year”, of “higher-than-average inflation in many countries” and of the continuing effects of a “persistently restrictive monetary policy”. In short, it doesn't seem like the most suitable time to invest in technologies that will arrive on the market with higher than normal list prices.
TOYODA'S SHOTS ON THE EV CAR
Even recently, speaking to industrialists in his country, the CEO of Toyota, Akio Toyoda , declared: “Japan is dependent on exports, therefore, carbon neutrality equates to an employment problem for the country. Some politicians say we need to turn all cars into electric vehicles or that the manufacturing industry is obsolete, but I don't think that's the case. To protect jobs and consequently also the lives of Japanese people, I think it is necessary to look to our future by working in the right direction so far".
In 2021, CEO Toyoda again supported his thesis on the need to proceed with a more reasoned and less sudden ecological transition by the fact that Japan produces around 10 million vehicles a year, of which around 50% is exported : well, forecasts assume that the Japanese industry can produce 8 million vehicles a year only with the contribution of combustion engines, including hybrids and PHEVs, even in 2030, while their elimination by law will paralyze the job market.
“This means production of 8 million units would be lost and the industry could risk having to shed most of the 5.5 million jobs,” Toyoda warned. “If internal combustion engines are the enemy, we will probably no longer be able to produce almost all the vehicles we assemble today with all the negative consequences that this situation would have for our economy.”
RID BETWEEN THE JAPANESE GOVERNMENT AND AUTO WORLD?
The most recent data coming from the trouble in the electric car sector of Western manufacturers seem to prove Toyota's number 1 right, but the Japanese government is no longer so convinced that remaining on the sidelines is the wisest move for the country, as demonstrated by the recent invitation addressed to the USA and the EU to collaborate precisely on electric mobility and on the semiconductor and critical metals supply chain.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/smartcity/perche-toyota-spara-a-zero-sulle-auto-elettriche/ on Fri, 27 Oct 2023 09:41:48 +0000.