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A few days ago, Automotive Industry focus learned from Guangzhou Auto Honda officials that the ODYSSEY model produced by Guangzhou Auto Honda's Zengcheng plant will be officially exported to Japan in the second half of 2023 and sold in the Japanese market. It is understood that this is the first time that Honda has imported new cars from China to the Japanese market for sale, and GAC Honda will also promote its export business to other countries in the future.

Affected by the epidemic, the global chip shortage and other factors, in order to control production costs, coupled with the gradual decline of consumer demand for cars and MPV models in the Japanese market, and to ensure profitability, Honda announced the closure of the Shirayama plant in Saitama Prefecture at the end of 2021, making Odyssey, Legend and Clarity models bid farewell to the Japanese market. However, after the suspension of Odyssey production in Japan, many consumers expressed a strong willingness to buy, so it began to spread that Honda plans to reverse introduce Odyssey from China into the Japanese market.

In October 1994, Honda launched its first MPV model, the Odyssey, in order to expand the segment of multi-purpose vehicles. As a global strategic model, it is sold in Japan, North America, Europe and other markets, co-produced with the fifth generation Honda Accord sharing platform, and uses the same powertrain. So far, it has been 18 years since the first generation of Odyssey was released, and it has gone through five generations.

Why GAC Honda Odyssey can resell the Japanese market? The fifth-generation Odyssey, codenamed RC, was first unveiled in November 2013 and was officially introduced by Guangzhou Auto Honda in August 2014, when the official price was 22.98-299800 yuan. It is worth mentioning that this generation of models after two medium-term changes, although the power from the previous 2.4L to the full 2.0L hybrid, the appearance is younger, but the essence of the car is still the same as eight years ago.

Odyssey's sales in the domestic market are not bad, with retail sales of 41282 vehicles in 2022, ranking fifth on the list of MPV models. If you add in the sister model, the Ericsson, which sells 35150 vehicles in 2022, Odyssey can actually sell 76000 vehicles in China. Compared with the Japanese market, the Odyssey sold only 10524 vehicles in the first half of 2021, with monthly sales of less than 2, 000.

While the Odyssey has boosted consumer demand in Japan, it does not allow Honda to reopen the production line to produce the model, and it may be more cost-effective to use GAC Honda's production line to produce the Odyssey for the Japanese market. Of course, whether the Odyssey can be sold back to the Japanese market shows that it is still a recognition of the productivity and product strength of Guangzhou Auto Honda.

At present, the domestic MPV market as a whole is in a stage of strong competition, and many car brands have released MPV models during the year, such as extreme Krypton 009, Teng Teng D9, Buick Century and Lanto Dreamer, focusing on high-end or new energy alternatives. With these models landing on the market one after another, old players in the MPV field will inevitably be hit, including the Odyssey. In this context, increasing export channels to expand sales is a way to save the Odyssey.

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