Japan is freaking out a little right now, much like the rest of the world. The country has a new prime minister, a new sense of its place in the world after a “lost decade” turned into “lost decades.” Does that apply to Toyota? I’m not so sure. Toyota looks like it’s in great shape.
Today was the first day of the Japan Mobility Show, and we’re already starting to see the concepts roll out on the pages of The Autopian. Toyota has a bunch of concepts to look at, though we’ve seen some of them before. Mostly, Toyota has a new energy
Could the same be said of Honda? The company is in a slightly different situation, and it seems to be looking inward at what it can accomplish in Japan during this show. Japan itself is in an interesting situation relative to the rest of the globe. President Trump is in Tokyo and asking Asian nations to contribute more to the American economy and global stability.
The reaction from Japan? Enthusiastic but measured. While companies like Toyota are willing to invest, a lot of the big numbers being thrown around may not exactly happen as the President has expressed. And a deal to stop Russian LNG? That might be an energy bridge too far.
Toyota’s New Century
Toyota took a lot of crap in the early part of this decade for, among other things, being “too slow” on electric cars. Instead, Toyota was careful and cautious, and invested heavily in hybrids as a bridge technology. That was clearly the right move.
There’s a column from Automotive News that drives this point home today:
Amid challenges and criticisms, the one thing that Toyota repeatedly does right is set a course and stick to it. In the U.S., that means moving forward with electric vehicles while continuing to expand hybrids and plug-in hybrid availability across the market and throughout its lineup.
Toyota’s $14 billion battery complex in North Carolina is beginning to produce batteries for its electrified vehicles in North America. Meanwhile, it still plans to introduce new three-row EVs next year that will be built in Kentucky, as well as bring in other new EVs, including the C-HR.
Why? Because it won’t be pushing those EVs on its dealers and customers, but allowing both to pull the vehicles as real market demand for them grows naturally — just as demand has grown for hybrids. Toyota’s determination to follow the multipath powertrain strategy it adopted nearly a decade ago has allowed it to capture share from competitors, especially those who now find themselves flat-footed because they opted to not offer hybrids.
Preach!
Toyota’s eclectic mix of concepts at the Japan Mobility Concept demonstrates a lot of swagger, including the crazy Century coupe:
Toyota Chairman Akio Toyoda gave a speech at the launch of the vehicle, and he didn’t sound like someone content to rest on his own laurels (or Levins, I guess). Referencing Kiichiro Toyoda and Toyota’s first chief engineer, Kenya Nakamura, Toyoda calls on his country and company to jump into action:
The “Japan as No.1” era is behind us, and we are now in what has come to be known as “the lost 30 years.”
Japan as a nation seems to have lost some of its energy and dynamism, along with our presence in the world.
If Kiichiro and Nakamura could see Japan today, what would they say?
I suspect they wouldn’t say anything, and instead leap straight into action.
When Nakamura saw the postwar media headline “Starting from Zero,” he said, “It’s not zero. It’s true that our facilities were destroyed, and we had no materials or money. But we had the strengths and skills that Japan had built up. That’s why we were able to rebuild.”
He said that in anger.
Toyota is in a great position globally, with a lot of production in the United States, and products people want. While it was slow to develop EVs, it’s not like Toyota can’t build a great EV.
They’re smart, so if you’re a competitor, watch out.
Honda Isn’t In Bad Shape, Either, Though It Feels A Bit More Insular
Sam has a full write-up on what Japan is doing at the big show, and it feels like Japan is sort of the focus. Not like I blame Honda. The company is also well-situated when it comes to hybrids and other products in the United States, although it has some issues and exposure when it comes to production in Mexico and to the new Nexperia chip shortage, as Nikkei Asia writes:
Honda also said it began adjusting output in the U.S. and Canada on Monday due to a shortage of Nexperia chips. The company did not disclose details, such as the scale of the cuts or how long it expects them to last. A prolonged slowdown in North America, its key manufacturing base, could weigh on the company’s earnings for the fiscal year ending March 2026.
The Celaya auto plant in central Mexico, which has suspended operations, has an annual capacity of around 200,000 cars and makes the HR-V sport utility vehicle. Last year, the plant turned out more than 190,000 vehicles, far exceeding the 40,000 sold in Mexico, making it a major export hub for the U.S. market.
North America is Honda’s important market. In 2024, the company sold about 1.61 million vehicles across the region, including the U.S. and Mexico, making up about 40% of its global sales.
It would be bold of Honda to bring some of the cars it showed in Japan to the United States, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Toyota: Uh, No, We Are Not Giving You $10 Billion Mr. President
If you ask for $100, no one is going to give you $1 billion. But if you ask for $10 billion, well, a cold $1 billion doesn’t seem like such a stretch. This appears to be the strategy from President Trump, who keeps stating that different countries will invest billions of dollars, only to find out that the promises are really for loans and not cash.
This happened earlier this week with South Korea, which didn’t want to destabilize its own currency in the process of making investments. That’s probably less of a risk with the Japanese yen, but companies like Toyota are smart and don’t want to over-invest in one market.
Per Reuters:
Speaking during his visit to Japan on Tuesday evening, Trump said the automaker would be looking to invest around $10 billion in the United States.
However, Toyota executive Hiroyuki Ueda said no such explicit promise was made about an investment of that size, adding that Toyota would continue to invest and create jobs in America.
Ueda was speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Japan Mobility Show in Tokyo.
Look, let’s just make it $8 billion between friends and call it a day, of which $300 million is going to be earmarked for The Autopian to build a test track. Thank you, Toyota!
Japan Probably Won’t Be Shutting Out Russian LNG
Japan’s new Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi [Ed Note: She’s a car enthusiast! -DT] stepped into the job at a difficult time between her country and the United States. The big question going into this week has been: Could she appeal to President Trump?
It seemed to go well, according to The Japan Times:
“It was a near-perfect meeting,” LDP Policy Research Council Chairman Takayuki Kobayashi said after the summit Tuesday. “We were able to demonstrate to the world the strength of the Japan-U.S. relationship and the close rapport between our leaders.”
Even the head of the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP), which has often been critical of the LDP, welcomed Takaichi’s performance.
“It is most significant that, despite it being their first meeting, they were able to start off on a harmonious note through their shared friendship with the late Prime Minister Shinzo Abe,” CDP leader Yoshihiko Noda said Tuesday, adding that the key outcome of the summit was “the establishment of a personal relationship of trust.”
Experts agree, with many describing the meeting as an “overwhelming success,” especially considering the tumult and uncertainty in bilateral relations over the past year.
I credit all the F-150s that Japan is going to buy.
Not everything was perfect, and President Trump’s request to freeze out Russian LNG as punishment for their illegal and cruel occupation of Ukraine doesn’t seem to have gone over, according to Nikkei Asia:
The U.S. is seeking cooperation from Group of Seven nations to impose an embargo on energy imports from Russia in order to ratchet up pressure on the country. Trump reportedly reiterated this request to Takaichi during their working lunch at the summit.
Russia accounts for nearly 9% of Japan’s LNG imports. A ban on Russian imports would have repercussions for the economy, leading Takaichi to determine that an embargo would not be possible.
You can’t win ’em all.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
All of the outtakes from Bruce Springsteen’s sessions for Nebraska are out and, honestly, incredible. I’m not Springsteen-pilled, although Nebraska is one of my all-time favorite albums. The raw and stripped down version of “Pink Cadillac” above, and “Born in the USA” are both eye-opening.
The Big Question
What could Toyota be doing even better?
Photo: Toyota
Smart or lucky?
I don’t think neglecting to invest in EVs, then having someone hell bent on destroying that part of the economy and infrastructure was necessarily smart. If the stable genius hadn’t been elected, Toyota wouldn’t look so good.
I’m pretty sure they have a lot invested in EVs but have realised that they aren’t going to compete with the Chinese and the tech hasn’t made huge inroads while the charging situation is still not resolved. They will have more EVs in due time but VW and the europeans have showen that rushing in is not the best course of action right now.
Well, there is a theory that when the cost of doing something is dropping fast enough, waiting until the last possible moment to start is the wise choice.
Also Apple has demonstrated that the first mover advantage is often illusory.
I still think that dumb luck has more to do with it.
Thought maybe it makes me a sexist pig or something, but I can’t help it that Japan’s new Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi reminds me a little bit of the fictional Prime Minister Yoko Kayabuki from Ghost in The Shell.
https://ghostintheshell.fandom.com/wiki/Yoko_Kayabuki
I definitely did not agree with all of his politics and policies, but I liked Shinzo Abe. Despite her conservative streak, the fact that PM Takichi was a protoge of his is a positive thing IMO.
The Koreans seem to poised to eat Toyota’s lunch.
Once again our automotive press was wrong – seemingly every other car review of a Toyota product over the last few years questioned why they were “sO FaR bEhInD” in the move to electrification. It is almost as if a multi-billion dollar company with some of the smartest engineers in the world didn’t know better than some english-major drop-outs who had no technical background and just want to get wowed by some new gimmick.
I said it before: Hybrids are acceptable to the new generations of adult drivers buying new cars. Why? Because they grew up with them and so they are the norm. When the Prius was introduced it was like Volvos in the 70s. The domain of eco-warriors, celebrities, and college professors(nerd alert). Now, they just…..are.
I sort of gradually inherited my mom’s Prius she bought when she was 85, and the only two things that are a problem are pickup bros freaking out that they have been passed by a Prius, passing, then realizing they are going 94mpg and slowing down again, and I kind of of wish that Toyota had blessed it with a LSD, or simply programmed the computer to back off a bit if one of the front wheels is spinning noticeably faster than the other three. Programming the wheel spin out wouldn’t be that difficult.
Other than that, the thing is nearly invisible, sometimes 10% of the cars on the road are silver Priuses. It would make an excellent getaway car.
Toyota appears to be playing capitalism well. Hybrids are still a waste of time
Make the Corolla Touring Hybrid Wagon available outside of Europe and Japan would be a fine start.
“Russia accounts for nearly 9% of Japan’s LNG imports”
Well yeah, where did you THINK that hydrogen economy was coming from?
https://www.world-energy.org/article/20028.html
“the postwar media headline “Starting from Zero,””
Sounds more like a Mitsubishi thing.
Re: the Crown concept. Another silly and bizarre idea coming out of this trade show. And man, is it ugly. As are the Honda concepts shown. IMHO.
That out of the way, can someone give some background on this Nexperia situation? I’ve done some basic searching, but I don’t know how this situation has come to pass.
They could look at what Bozi is doing, say “hold my beer” and come out with a GR’d and Lexus’d Prius Prime giving us an efficient luxury hot hatch CT 350 for the ages.
Japan should tell the extortion loving Orange Turd to fuck off, and shove his bullshit up his ass.
Maybe sounds harsh, but it’s past time for countries, colleges, and media to just say “screw you.”
Who the fuck told this ass that he is the boss of the entire world?
Seriously.
In a very Japanese way, that’s exactly what they did.
This could be a very simple cultural disagreement. There has been more than one negotiation between Japanese and other cultures where someone goes to Japan and thought they got everything they asked for. Japanese say yes (hai) with a little nod of the head to acknowledge they heard your statement – that doesn’t mean they agreed with it.
Also you have to remember that Trump cares about press releases and flattery not policy. The last term was full of companies and countries promising to do thing so he could get his press release and then just going on with business as usual.
He also asks for a LOT less depending on where the investment is made. He is openly taking bribes from foreign countries that “invest” in his crypto
In general, some, but not all Japanese people are hard to understand. Hai and a nod doesn’t mean yes, or indicate happiness. They are very good at hiding true feelings.
I remember reading that Japanese have some strange cultural habits. Like as shown in anime (granted, anime censorship has grown and clamp down on such things has happened, but still).
The USA and Japan just have very different cultures. Japan is very communal while the US is very individual. In the US you might go into a meeting, have direct and open arguments and then after go about your day after. In Japan negotiation happens before the meeting, in private, one on one. In meetings it is very rude to opening disagree or contradict someone else.
I’ve seen this first hand having worked for a Japanese company and seeing a new hire go into a meeting and come out thinking that management agreed to everything he proposes when in reality no decision was made at all.
Right Now is but a moment in time.
And with “much” respect…/s
Toyota, please buy Mitsubishi and put us enthusiasts out of our misery with the Renault alliance… no pun intended.
I’m not sure it’s the same as doing things better, but these are what I don’t like about Toyota:
– I don’t like how they are going hybrid-only. Hybrids still cost a lot more, and I don’t dirve a lot. So I can’t save that much money on fuel.
– I don’t like the picture that’s in my head about Toyota. German cars might be owned by assholes, but those are people honest about being an asshole, who think they are better than you, while Toyota owners seem to be like “I’m better than you, since I have a Toyota, but I act like I’m like everyone else” – and they are bad at acting.
– I don’t speak japanese, so I might be wrong, but it looks like in Japan Toyota is the brand with the lower entry prices compared to, for example, Nissan. And I don’t like how it’s the opposite in Europe, and I think also in the US. Maybe that could help with my problem #2, if Toyota would be a car for everybody here too, like it is in Japan.
What could Toyota do better?
I have a list.
I know some Toyota Pious owners that dumped it for a non hybrid, when a crazed Nissan Versa crashed into it, and then drove off, right in front of us.
You know, as they are wont to do.
They weren’t happy with the extra costs.
The genius early Honda Insight only major failing is that the electric section is inextricable from the engine.
Any failure of the hybrid system bricks the entire car.
At that point, dual systems go from an asset to a liability.
“The genius early Honda Insight only major failing is that the electric section is inextricable from the engine.
Any failure of the hybrid system bricks the entire car”
Counterpoint: Opens the opportunity for a K24/6MT swap.
It’s got a hell of a frame on it.
“Toyota owners seem to be like “I’m better than you, since I have a Toyota, but I act like I’m like everyone else” – and they are bad at acting.”
If anyone with a Corolla thinks they’re better than you what does that say about you?
Hybrids are generally just a couple of thousand more than ICE only. why would you be buying a new car if you don’t drive much anyway?
Toyota drivers are generally pretty chilled and the forums I am are in have a lot of engineers and practical people in them. Most have other brand cars as well.
Toyota cars are a bit pricier in Japan than the other Japanese brands (similarly to the other parts of the world).
That red car is pretty swank.
It seems like Toyota needs to learn from the Chinese. 5 years is too long for vehicle development. Needs to be 2 years or less. They could have seen what the Maverick did and gotten something out by now but they saw what it did and started development Ford will basically have it’s 3rd gen out before Toyota has something to fight it. They also need to keep quality up and prices down. That probably also means reigning in dealers. Reputation is what’s selling vehicles for them them now people are noticing the quality is down.
The thing about the Chinese market is basically no one is making money. They could take over, or it could be the next economic crisis after the real estate one… Time will tell
Most of that is down to extreme competition and market saturatation. It doesn’t have anything to do vehicle development time that has increased a lot over the years with the established companies outside of China. More time more money on development
Real estate problems could be easily dealt with, if anyone has the will to do it.
Churning laundered money and hedge funds through residential property both have the same effect.
Will Americans tolerate it?
Let’s watch!
NO. The one thing they SHOULD NOT do is compromise their quality and durability testing. Remember the scandal they had back in 2024?
Already we have seen this in MANY EXAMPLES- the Tundra V35A recall (yes, models past the recalled dates are failing). Yes, the engine can hit 300k miles, but the cost to replace the motor is WHAT I am concerned about.
The Chinese are in the business of making disposable vehicles. You buy one in 2021- in 2025 it is outdated. And, virtually no parts support.
The cult of Toyota makes me hesitant to own one. If I had one I would be shaming other owners of every other manufacturer. And the arguments for reliability have grown old (unless if it is something like an LC70 or a base model Hilux).
what does “shaming owners of every other manufacturer mean?” are you worried what others think of you? Thats as bad as buying something to impress people.
I once picked up my wealthy future father in law from the airport in my 20 year old Toyota (I kept it immaculate) and he was impressed that his daughter wasn’t dating a flashy show off in a european car.
A little bit of both. I respect your choice, but lets be honest- I will admit I simply do NOT have the money for a used Toyota. Many do not either.
For example- I was at a motorshow in Qatar once. I saw a couple of GMC Sierra Single Cabs( that was when they were new in 2016). I made a comment that they were “break-down vehicles” (very common stereotype with American cars back then, although not very true), and my father told me to hush up, because some people may not like it. You might not get what I am saying, but if you were in my situation and told it directly to someone who has it in their face- they would get angry for sure.
Toyota loyalists have always made fun of me for not owning what they have. I was even told that what I have (Chevrolet) would be a headache to own (granted- the newer ones are yet to prove themselves, but quality across the board is down), either on Reddit or in real life. All these comments made me feel extremely bad.
And the toxic cult of Toyota is what prevents me from getting one. I am pretty much done with the recommendations being biased when they either are way too expensive for most people in the used market (how would someone like it when I force them to buy a Toyota even though they don’t have the money to). Toyota loyalists on the internet have a record of insulting others when they did not get a Toyota. Now, I don’t mean to say everyone, but a good number I have seen.
I get that Toyotas are great for fuel efficiency, but I feel that they are very overrated. As a cheap mode of transport, they do well (Corolla, Camry).
As for the dating comment- well, suffice to say, I don’t think women care about what car someone owns. I don’t really like Mercedes or BMW as although they are flashy and look nice- they tend to break after the warranty period if abused. Neither have the manly look like most old GMC/Chevrolet trucks do either. Besides, I would prefer a beater OBS instead.
For the record, in terms of marriage I would prefer someone who is a vegetarian or vegan, and who looks great. Not someone who is a money grabber and wants the best or flashiest Range Rover. Someone who has the same interests in cars as I do.
I hope I was clear. Each person to their own.
As someone in vehicle design and engineering, hahahaha.
It takes a long time to design and engineer a vehicle, even when starting at a developed platform. Many processes cannot be done in parallel, and throwing more people at the problem does not solve it faster. With the added complexity of modern vehicles, safety regulations, and new tech development, 4-6 years is what it takes to make a good vehicle. You can shorten that timeframe, but only if you straight up skip steps which is evident in the Chinese vehicle teardowns I’ve seen.
Yes, have seen the youtube where carsauce put a Chinese ute on a hoist and run through the welding with an engineer (john cadogan- auto expert)and its no way the standard of Ford or Toyota. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCXUCCV1oqo&t=1121s
MAXUS T60 has a pretty bad record with rust. I don’t know how they are now, but I do see them in Qatar.
I really prefer to buy a product that has had a few years of production history.
That was the great thing about Volvo and w123 Mercedes, or American pickups before they turned them into cars.
Of all the reasons not to buy a Tesla, the fact that they all look the same is not one of them.
I used to pick the same and would wait until the niggly faults were worked out in the first years of production but weirdly my most reliable longest term car is a very early VIN number 1988 corolla alltrac wagon (now with 330,000kms on the Odometer. Original mechanicals including clutch and radiator). However as it has every rare option on ($3,000 sunroof!) might have been a press car.