Honda Motor Co. will invest 10 trillion yen ($64.8 billion) by 2030 in its effort to shift toward electrification, Chief Executive Officer Toshihiro Mibe said Thursday.
Honda also aims to reduce EV manufacturing costs by over 30% and plans to bring down battery procurement costs by 20% in North America, Mibe told reporters as part of the company’s update on its business plans.
Honda will launch a total of seven new EV models globally by 2030 and plans for EVs and fuel cell vehicles to account for 40% of its global sales by the same time, he said.
“We are aiming to build EVs with better software than cars currently in the market,” he said.
Honda and its peers are looking to claw back market share in China, where they’ve been losing ground to domestic EV makers that are viewed by discerning local consumers as better able to meet their specific tastes. That’s ramped up pressure on Japanese legacy automakers’ operations, with Honda planning cuts to its full-time factory workforce in China amid declining sales.
As part of its push, Honda plans to start selling two EV models for its newly announced Ye series, in China later this year. It also aims go all-electric by 2040.
Honda and other automakers with hybrid lineups are benefiting from a broad slowdown in global EV demand that’s being driven by higher interest rates and waning subsidies. The company is targeting hybrid sales of about 1 million units this year and is laying the groundwork to build capacity to 2 million units annually. Yet, they’re also betting that the long-term shift toward clean energy remains unchanged.
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