And, a recent tour of one of the Asian powerhouse’s vehicle plants has proved this beyond a shadow of a doubt, at least to Honda President and CEO Toshihiro Mibe.
“We have no chance against this,” Mibe said upon a visit to a Shanghai parts factory, commenting on its seamless automation across all levels of production. Logistics, procurement and all aspects of the process were so automated, in fact, that he did not spot a single human worker on the supplier’s floor.
Ford executives saying even three years ago that China was way ahead of the game
Toyota’s CEO has likewise said regarding not just his company, but the industry in general, “unless things change, we will not survive”
In my area last year I was legitimately looking at all options. Toyota lot was the biggest disappointment. They had 1 RAV4 that was completely stripped, cloth seats, barely any features etc. but somehow the payments were still $150 more per month than leases on better equipped EVs at that point (prior to the federal tax credit expiration). I asked the Toyota guy if he had any other competitive options and he tried to tell me I should get a massive truck (Tundra).
The guy at my lot said, “you won’t be able to find what you’re looking for; cause even if we stripped everything out, it would still be the MSRP base price.” And I was just floored by that. I walked off the lot, went home and got a PHEV from Mazda and ended up $2000 under asking; had to stay for hours though. Best I could do cause the only comparable cargo and seat size EV was a KIA EV7 (the suburban looking one). I wanted the Ioniq5, but a buddy of mine had a problem with his and Hyundai was terrible to him. Everything else in that size was just too expensive because all the EVs at that level have so many useless features.
It’s worse than that- the Toyota distributors in my area have a regional monopoly and add a non-negotiable $2000 worth of useless crap to every car for 500 miles.
$129 screen protector for the radio $80 for a bag of red USB cables $700 for “enhanced warranty protection” $1200 for nano-ceramic-ionic-polymeric paint and underbody coating