Tag: mazda

EV Hold-out Mazda Changes Its Tune

Mazda CEO Yamanouchi - Credit MazdaMazda Motor is shifting direction to make its own hybrid and battery-electric vehicles, according to a report today in Automotive News (may require subscription). The move, if confirmed, would mark a rapid retreat from the ‘trend-bucking’ EV skepticism that has been a staple of Mazda’s message.

Mazda R&D chief Seita affirmed late last month that Mazda would achieve mandated fuel economy savings by improving engines and transmissions, and by redesigning vehicles to reduce their weight. The Detroit News quoted president and CEO Takashi Yamanouchi echoing that sentiment at last week’s New York International Auto Show, promising release of a brand new engine next year.

However, Seita had also admitted that Mazda lacked the cash to finance development of its own EV powertrains. And this weekend’s Automotive News report directly contrasts the old strategy, quoting Yamanouchi as saying that hybrids and battery-powered electric vehicles developed in-house will contribute to its plan in order to “boost the average fuel economy of its cars globally 30 percent by 2015.”

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by pfairley

Mazda’s Hybrid-free Strategy of Necessity

mazda-tribute-credit-mazda-usa
Mazda's Tribute SUV uses Ford technology

How to make sense out of the bewildering differences in strategy by automakers today? In the case of Mazda, which rejects hybrid vehicles as a fad, the strategy may be one of necessity.

Mazda R&D chief Seita Kanai confirmed last week that Mazda still has no plans to commercialize its own hybrid technology, according to a report last week in Automobile Magazine. The Japanese automaker markets a hybrid version of its Tribute, a small SUV, which Automobile  Magazine writes off as a Ford engineered system closely resembling the technology in Ford’s Hybrid Escape. Kanai said Mazda will achieve mandated fuel economy savings by improving engines and transmissions, and by redesigning vehicles to reduce their weight.

But Kanai also admitted at the same event for reporters in Japan last week that Mazda couldn’t afford to field a hybrid. And he acknowledged that the resulting technology gap represented a worrisome problem for the company with buyers enamored of hybrids. Here’s how Kanai put it, according to Automotive News:

“We’re in real trouble,” Kanai said of the rapidly falling hybrid prices. “It’s a threat. We don’t have the resources to get involved in that kind of competition.”

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by pfairley