Nissan Leaf leads regressing market
In May, some 1.025 units were registered in the Japanese PEV market, down 62% YoY, which is worse than the YTD result (-31%) and also worse than the overall market behavior (-19% YoY in 2020, -45% last month), with the Japanese plugin market highly dependent from the leader Nissan Leaf behavior, with the Nissan EV owning almost half of the market, and because the Leaf has seen better days (-38% YoY)...
...The local plugin market is also on a bad place. The 2020 PEV share is now at 0.7% share (0,5% in May), down 0.1% regarding the 2019 result, and one wonders what can pull sales North of the 1% mark again.
But...What? The current leader Nissan Leaf continues sliding, and the same can be said about the remaining podium members, the Toyota Prius PHEV is down 18% this year, while the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV is dropping by 33%, so there's really no major hopes for recovery coming from these three.
Maybe the savior role will belong to the upcoming Toyota RAV4 PHEV?
On the Honda field, all hopes are going to the Honda e EV, but then again, i believe the model is too niche, abd on the unlikely scenario that the model is indeed a success, will Honda have enough batteries for it?
What's left? Mazda is lauching the MX-30, once again, a model too niche to be a major sales success, Lexus doesn't seem very commited to its UX300e EV, Subaru and Daihatsu are too dependent from Toyota's anti-BEV stubburness, while Suzuki is focusing it's electrification efforts in India...so there are doubts that 2020 will provide the necessary recovery to this market.
The only positive news come from the #4 Mitsubishi Minicab MIEV, tripling its sales regarding last year (fleet deals?), while in #5 we have the Tesla Model 3, that is now the Best Selling Foreign model in Japan.
The sad thing is that the Honda e didn't have to be niche: being in a very popular segment (in Europe at least), and with very attractive styling, it could have had significant mainstream appeal -- if only the designers hadn't insisted on giving it a tiny battery... Which is especially disappointing considering that it's the only car in this segment beside the BMW i3 built on a dedicated platform from scratch -- so surely there were no technical issues with fitting a more appropriately sized battery; just stubborn instance on repeating Nissan's and others' mistake, against all evidence that tiny battery EVs don't sell, no matter how much they try to market it as "urban"...
ReplyDeleteLooking just at the design, inside and out, the Honda e is my favorite small EV.
DeleteThen, i look at the price and battery size and...it loses a few points.
Currently, it's tied with the Mini Cooper EV, BMW i3 and Honda e
There's also the issue of it having extremely tiny cargo area, even for a car its size.
Deletejapan is a land of setting sun.
ReplyDeletesince the departure of carlos ghosn, the entire nissan is out there to kill leaf and ariya is just for chinese market. it wont be sold elsewhere. dont put any hopes on rav-4 plugin or those from mazda, subaru either. mazda has slowed the pickup in their BEV to match with the gasser. only when the tesla & chinese start selling their BEV worldwide, the japs will learn their lesson.
Are you aware that "japs" is a derogative term?
DeleteI wonder where you got the idea that Ariya is just for the Chinese market... They already have a bunch of China-only models -- but they (obviously) haven't been hyping any of these at international events.
Famlin, i doubt the Ariya is just for the Chinese market, if it were, they wouldn't make such a big fuss about it.
DeleteAnd i agree with antrik, "japs" remind of WWII nicknames, we are now in 2020, not 1945.
@jose & @antrik
DeleteI apologize. But can you please explain
1. why japanese bought only 4.5% of imported vehicles
2. why japanese bought less than 2,000 Teslas last year (actually 1,378)
3. why japanese arrested Carlos Ghosn on baseless charges.
If they export whole lot of goods to other countries and never import any, how will people in developing world get jobs and progress.
And japanese work 80 hours/week with no time for family and this brings down their own population. Nationalism at its worst.
https://www.best-selling-cars.com/japan/2019-full-year-japan-best-selling-car-brands-and-market-analysis/
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/03/03/business/tesla-auto-market-japan/#.XvINJShKh3g
@famlin I'm not contesting that the extremely closed market is a problem -- and that it gives Japanese car makers a false sense of security, while they are heading straight for oblivion... No need for name-calling, though :-)
Delete@antrik
Deleteaccepted. i will refrain from name calling in future.
Japan is an extremely conservative society and an extremely aged society. And its car manufacturers following a different path. I heavily doubt that we will see any noticeable movement in Japan in the next years.
ReplyDeleteBut it doesnt matter at all. I guess Europe and China will be the driving forces. In 2021 Tesla will have facilities in China, Germany and Netherlands and the European manufacturers are moving now too. And the EU emission reductions will push towards EV's too. Thus, the focus will be on Europe and China for all manufacturers. Japan and USA will fall behind
Let's not give up hope that the fossils stooge will get voted out soon, and things will start moving again in the US...
DeleteStill trust China?!
DeletePersonal thoughts isn't reliable dude
Yeah, there's still hope for the US, if Donald Duck loses, and after the following dust settles in, we could have them returning to the EV path.
Delete@Anonymous it's not a matter of trust. The Chinese regime will do anything they think is to their advantage. As long as they think pushing EVs is, we should be glad about it -- without necessarily endorsing anything else they do...
DeleteThats correct Sven Dubai
ReplyDeleteJapanese are stubborn and thats why they buy just 5,000 Ford & GM vehicles / year while Toyota sells 6,000 vehicles / day in USA.
Japanese are stubborn and thats why they arrested Carlos Ghosn fraudulently and now Nissan is going down badly.
Japanese are stubborn and thats why Honda, Mazda, Subaru are refusing to sell BEVs.
They will pay the price.
Carlos Ghosn was a great EV advocate, and it's a shame what they did to him.
ReplyDeleteAny Idea what the xEV or hybrid market is in Japan? I know at one point the Prius and the Nissan E note hybrids were top sellers?
ReplyDelete