Lots of people saying Toyota missed the boat on EVs. I'm not convinced the technology, infrastructure or battery supply is ready for true mass production of EVs. Toyota makes 10 million cars a year, they'll be selling good EVs soon enough to put Tesla to shame.
Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
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Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#32I had a Toyota. It was a great car, and a real testament to the engineering prowess Toyoda established. I see very clear, very interesting Innovator's Dilemma vibes, though, in how widely they've missed the boat on EVs. I wouldn't be surprised if we see Toyota lose its dominance in the coming decade. It's sad, since the Prius was such a gamechanger. Maybe the passing of the torch here will let them start to catch up.
For the batteries in each EV, you could make 7 plug-in hybrids. That's 1 full electric and 6 gas cars, vs 7 plug-in hybrids. I think Toyota's approach would save more emissions so long as we are battery constrained.
Depends on how the energy is generated and transmitted really.
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
For the batteries in each EV, you could make 7 plug-in hybrids. That's 1 full electric and 6 gas cars, vs 7 plug-in hybrids. I think Toyota's approach would save more emissions so long as we are battery constrained.
A lot of people who own plug-in hybrids don't really ever plug them in which makes them worse than gasoline cars or non-plugin hybrids because of added weight.
What? That doesn’t sound right. I would have to think the majority of people plug them in. That is the whole point of paying more for a plug-in.
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#34I had a Toyota. It was a great car, and a real testament to the engineering prowess Toyoda established. I see very clear, very interesting Innovator's Dilemma vibes, though, in how widely they've missed the boat on EVs. I wouldn't be surprised if we see Toyota lose its dominance in the coming decade. It's sad, since the Prius was such a gamechanger. Maybe the passing of the torch here will let them start to catch up.
For the batteries in each EV, you could make 7 plug-in hybrids. That's 1 full electric and 6 gas cars, vs 7 plug-in hybrids. I think Toyota's approach would save more emissions so long as we are battery constrained.
This was true several years ago but if you look now there are hundreds of GWh of cell plants coming online over the next 3 years. Toyota is very late here and won’t be able to produce dedicated BEVs at scale until 2026+. Competitors will already be on their 2nd or 3rd generation BEV platforms by then.
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#35I remember being shocked in the 90s at finding out the Toyota Corolla had the highest value retention of any car according to the Kelly Blue Book. And then there was the NUMMI joint-venture of Toyota and GM and the same exact cars that would come out of that factory would have different value retention. Obviously the GM car would depreciate more in value. Brand reputation clearly matters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wik…
There's an excellent episode of This American Life about the NUUMI experiment and why it failed to change GM.
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#36Lots of people saying Toyota missed the boat on EVs. I'm not convinced the technology, infrastructure or battery supply is ready for true mass production of EVs. Toyota makes 10 million cars a year, they'll be selling good EVs soon enough to put Tesla to shame.
Toyota is building one of the most reliable and robust cars for the masses. With attitude to build cars they will be competitive for very long.
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#37> establishing a culture of quality control that helped Toyota evolve into a world-leading automaker. A lot of the JIT stuff that is so common, these days, was revolutionary, when he introduced it. I'm told that many agile techniques also had their genesis in his work.
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Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are there though? Toyota is never perceived as a luxury brand, it is associated with quality, reliability and maintainability. Something that you can hardly say about Apple.
That's highly dependent upon which country you're in. In the United States, Toyota has a separate brand for their luxury offerings (Lexus), and so what you say is true. But in other countries, those nice Lexus cars are sold as Toyotas.
Yes, I came to say that if I were to buy a luxury car, it would be a fancy Toyota AKA Lexus. I wonder if most people aren't aware of that? And Cadillac is just GM? It's hardly unusual in the American market - I believe it's been called badge engineering for at least as long as I've been alive.
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#39Lots of people saying Toyota missed the boat on EVs. I'm not convinced the technology, infrastructure or battery supply is ready for true mass production of EVs. Toyota makes 10 million cars a year, they'll be selling good EVs soon enough to put Tesla to shame.
Yep. Related to their principle of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genchi_Genbutsu
Re: Shoichiro Toyoda, who turned Toyota into global automaker, has died
#40Lots of people saying Toyota missed the boat on EVs. I'm not convinced the technology, infrastructure or battery supply is ready for true mass production of EVs. Toyota makes 10 million cars a year, they'll be selling good EVs soon enough to put Tesla to shame.
Volkswagen makes 10 million cars a year and they're pushing hard for EVs now.
The main difference between Volkswagen's and Toyota's situation is that Toyota is still in a good position to meet fleet emissions requirements globally because they've been selling hybrids for so long. But Volkswagen needs to pump out EVs now to meet their fleet emissions targets.
Fleet emissions fines are simply dead money. You're much better off putting that money into your EV development program.
Toyota has to sell EVs at scale eventually because new car ICE vehicle sales bans now and into the future mean that all car manufacturers have to.