AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)01/30 Report--

On January 30th Honda China announced an epic adjustment.

Honda China announced that in order to accelerate the promotion of electrification and further strengthen the strategic operation system of Honda production in China, Honda Technology (China) Co., Ltd. (HMCT), a wholly owned subsidiary of Honda Technology (China) Co., Ltd. (EGCH), will merge with Honda production Technology (China) Co., Ltd. (EGCH). The main business of EGCH will be undertaken by Honda Technology (China) Co., Ltd. manufacturing technology Guangzhou branch.

According to the data, HMCT was established in November 2013 with a registered capital of 40 million yuan. It is mainly responsible for the product strategic planning, production strategic planning, automotive research and development, and procurement strategic planning of Honda China. EGCH was founded in July 2004 with a registered capital of 14 million US dollars. It is mainly engaged in research and development in the field of production technology, design, manufacture and assembly of production equipment, and provides technical support to Honda production bases in China.

In order to speed up the electrification process, Honda also adjusted the personnel of its Chinese headquarters and announced the new organizational and operating system.

In terms of personnel, the current Honda Minister Katsushi Inoue of China will step down on April 1, 2023 and take up the post of Honda Executive Officer and Minister of Electric Power Development. Inoue joined Honda Technology Research Industrial Co., Ltd. in April 1986 and became Honda Cars India Ltd in April 2015, according to the data. In April 2016, he became executive attendant, European minister and Honda Motor Europe Ltd of Honda Technical Research Industry Co., Ltd. Take the president of Founding Service. Four years later, Inoue became executive servant and minister of China of Honda Technology Research Industry Co., Ltd., general manager of Honda Technology Research Industry (China) Investment Co., Ltd., and general manager of Honda Technology (China) Co., Ltd.

Mr. Inoue will step down as Minister of Honda China in April 2023. This position will be replaced by Igarashi Fumihiko Yashi, Honda Executive Service member and Minister of Asia and Oceania, colleague and General Manager of Honda Technology Research Industry (China) Investment Co., Ltd. According to the data, Igarashi Fumihiko joined Honda Technical Research Industry Co., Ltd. in April 1988 and became Honda Vietnam Co.,Ltd in April 2012. President, Honda Technology Research Industry Co., Ltd. was appointed Asia Oceania Minister and Asia Honda Motor Co.,Ltd in April 2018. In April 2022, he became the executive officer of Honda Technical Research Industry Co., Ltd.

In addition, Honda also announced a new organizational and operating system, a new electric industry development headquarters, and reorganized the regional headquarters organizational system. In order to strengthen the electric industry, Honda has set up a new electric enterprise development headquarters on the basis of the establishment of the enterprise development headquarters. At the same time, Honda has merged its six existing regional headquarters into one region, including Japan, Asia and Oceania, South America and Europe-Africa-Middle East, in addition to North America and China.

Honda's further bet on electrification is from products and regional operations divisions to the company's operating strategy and senior management adjustments. In April 2021, Minhong Mikuda, head of the research and development department of Harada, took up the post of chief executive officer, and Takahiro Baxiang stepped down. A major change at the top often means a major change in corporate strategy. After taking office, Minhong announced that the company would be carbon neutral by 2050. According to the plan, the proportion of pure electric vehicles and fuel cell vehicles sold in the global market will reach 40% in 2030, 80% in 2035 and 100% in 2040. However, for Honda, it is not easy to achieve such a goal in the reality that the pure electricity line lags behind the industry. Coupled with the volatile external environment of the industry, the pace of Honda's transformation to electrification seems to be more difficult.

In October 2021, Honda China released its electrification strategy with the launch of a new pure electricity brand "EVOR N" and a new intelligent and efficient pure electricity architecture "ERO N Architecture". Honda China announced at the press conference that it will launch 10 pure electric vehicles in the Chinese market in the next five years, and will sell only pure electric and hybrid models in China from 2030, instead of new fuel vehicles.

At the press conference, Honda China brought two new pure electric vehicles, one is the e:NS1 from Dongfeng Honda, and the other is the e:NP1 from Guangzhou Auto Honda. The two models are sister models to each other, positioning the small pure electric SUV. Among them, Dongfeng Honda e:NS1 was officially listed on April 26, 2022, and Guangzhou Automobile Honda e:NP1 was officially launched on June 20. The subsidized price range of the two models is 17.5-218000 yuan.

Electric cars are not popular, and fuel cars are difficult to sell, which is the current situation of Honda. Honda's cumulative sales of terminal cars in China in 2022 were 1.3731 million, down 12.07 per cent from a year earlier, according to data. Among them, Guangzhou Auto Honda sold 720700 vehicles, down 6.19% from the same period last year, while Dongfeng Honda sold 652400 vehicles, down 17.76% from the same period last year. Of course, the decline in sales is definitely due to the epidemic and the factors affecting the supply of spare parts, but it is more due to the weakening competitiveness of some products after upgrading. Accord's annual sales of 220800 vehicles were once again surpassed by the Camry, with 213900 CR-V vehicles, while the "magic car" Civic fell to 150800 vehicles, while Haoying, colorful Zhi and XR-V maintained at 100000 vehicles. Honda's launch of two new electric cars, the e:NP1 and the e:NS1, in China during the year also failed to generate positive market performance for Honda, which sold 3608 vehicles in the year, compared with 5180 for the latter, and two models that were not even as good as the CR-V PHEV (8894).

In other words, Honda needs to tell a whole new story of electrification. In June 2022, Honda and Sony announced a formal partnership, each holding 50 per cent to form an electric car company under the new brand name "AFEELA". The AFEELA is scheduled to go into production in Honda's US market and is scheduled to go on sale at the end of 2025 and deliver the first vehicles to the North American market in the spring of 2026.

The cooperation between Honda and Sony does have some intention of keeping warm. Generally speaking, although Honda is a well-known car brand in the world, it is more limited to the development of traditional cars and lacks advantages in intelligence, so it begins to look for new electric power points and try to make up for its own intelligent shortcomings by learning from its strong points to make up for its weaknesses.

How to find the right to speak again in the electrified era is an important goal for Japanese brands such as Honda, Toyota and Nissan to move towards motorization. Although Honda has more industrial accumulation, it is clear that Xiaomi and Baidu are more capable in the field of intelligence. Further, in the face of the intelligent accumulation of Baidu and Xiaomi, as well as the sales Great Wall built by Wei Xiaoli Tesla, Honda Electric Power may have to face more challenges if it wants to break through the tight encirclement.

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