Back in May, Honda announced that it was scaling back on its investment plans for pure electric vehicles as a part of a method realignment, slashing its R&D budget on electric models from 10 trillion yen (RM264 billion) to seven trillion yen (RM185 billion), with a number of the money saved going into hybrid powertrains as an alternative. It also revised its goal of getting EVs make up 30% of its sales by 2030.
Despite this and the next cancellation of a three-row EV SUV aimed toward the US market, electrification remained very much on the forefront of the automaker’s showcase on the recent Japan Mobility Show 2025, with the 0 Series Saloon and SUV sharing the stage with the brand new 0 α (Alpha) SUV study, which was the focus alongside the Super-One EV prototype.
How then does all this equate to a discount in focus, and, more importantly, where do hybrids sit within the scheme of things? In line with Honda president and representative executive officer Toshihiro Mibe, each EVs and hybrid vehicles are integral components to its business, although the direction wherein they’re being approached differ somewhat.
Talking to the Asia-Oceania press during an interview held after the show, he reiterated what he said earlier this yr in regards to the brand not abandoning its EV path. “It will not be really that we’re scaling back on the event of full battery EVs. It’s just that we’re saying that in comparison with our initial forecast, the worth would need to be lower than what we had envisaged earlier,” he said.
“The EV market is slowing down. But should you take a look at the medium or long-term perspective into this, then for carbon neutrality solution, EVs are still the optimal solution, we imagine. Our thought on that continues to be unchanged. We are only reviewing and revising the models and the worth, so we’ll still proceed to take a look at EVs and proceed to work on that,” he added.
Nonetheless, hybrids will play their part in ensuring that bridging and continuity is maintained. “While the EV volume will not be growing, during that point we’ll increase the amount of hybrid vehicles. By 2030, we’re planning for over two million units of hybrid vehicles. Up until 2030 at the very least, I imagine for our business, hybrid vehicles could be the principal portion of our business, and for battery vehicles in that point, we’ll proceed with our R&D activities,” Mibe said.
“We’ll proceed to develop hybrids. We’ve a plan to supply the evolved version of the mid-size hybrid in 2027, with a brand new system altogether for that. We even have research and development activities for a large-size hybrid as well. With that done, we will have all sizes of hybrids, from compact and small-size to mid- and large-size, and people will proceed to evolve going forward,” he said.
Mibe said that the hybrid path is a better one to approach, just because is is an area that the automaker already has a few years of experience in. “We’ve been developing that for over 25 years or so, which suggests we do have plenty of experience and know-how in relation to hybrid vehicles. So without spending, especially extraordinary development expenses, we will utilise our expertise, still keeping down the investment required, and develop models out of those,” he explained.
Inside this particular field, Mibe says expansion is feasible. “We’ll proceed to develop hybrids which might be suitable for every market. Somewhere between hybrids and EVs, there could possibly be space for the plug-in hybrid as well, I suppose,” Mibe ventured.
“If plug-in hybrids are needed between hybrids and EVs, we will develop these as soon as needed. Our two-motor hybrid systems (e:HEV) are equipped with a traction motor and generator motor, so it will not be difficult in any respect to evolve them into the plug-in hybrid,” he added.
As for research and development, Mibe said that the corporate was working on the following generation of electrified platforms, and would proceed to introduce recent technologies to further develop them.
“Those will turn into recent technologies that we will launch into the market in the long run, the evolved version of those platforms. It’s our wish that the electrical vehicle business might be sufficiently big to be similar to the ICE (internal combustion engine) business of today,” he concluded.
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This Article First Appeared At paultan.org
