Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen • Hacker News Board

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#11

Post by rantwasp » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:51 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #4

My pet theory is that Toyota or Honda will be on life support by the end of next decade, if not dead. They both had a huge head start in batteries with their hybrids (Honda’s first hybrid was released in 1999), and they squandered it. Hopefully the Korean car companies crush them with superior products.

that’s a bold prediction. i don’t think it’s going to happen.

building a car is about more than just the engine. It’s about the supply chain, it’s about parts, it’s about service. Toyota and Honda have a lot more experience in this area than a new-ish car manufacturer. They also build reliable, great cars that I like owning and driving.

I like how everyone is up in arms about Toyota doing something [that serves their interest; in a legal way] to influence the government but people pretend Tesla is such a success story, ignoring all the money the govn has pumped into it.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#12

Post by dnautics » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:52 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #4

My pet theory is that Toyota or Honda will be on life support by the end of next decade, if not dead. They both had a huge head start in batteries with their hybrids (Honda’s first hybrid was released in 1999), and they squandered it. Hopefully the Korean car companies crush them with superior products.

This is unlikely. Toyota, anyways, has really excelled in other ways, for example, using supply chains correctly and not taking a huge hit during the semiconductor shortage. The car market is also relatively slow to shift, I do think that there's plenty of time for Toyota to pivot.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#13

Post by sithadmin » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:52 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #4

My pet theory is that Toyota or Honda will be on life support by the end of next decade, if not dead. They both had a huge head start in batteries with their hybrids (Honda’s first hybrid was released in 1999), and they squandered it. Hopefully the Korean car companies crush them with superior products.

There's zero chance Toyota ends up on 'life support' within a decade. They're a top 10 company globally in terms of revenue, and even in the worst case where they fail to release competitive EV models, the global switchover to hybrid electric (plus legacy ICE sales) in less developed markets will hold them over for quite a bit of time.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#14

Post by rantwasp » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:53 PM UTC

ramesh31 wrote: post #6

I think they bet perfectly fine, if you ignore the silly hydrogen efforts. Toyota has never been a technological front runner. They take the Apple approach; wait for something to be truly ready for prime time, then execute it better than anyone else. EV's are still 2% of the US market. And it will be a decade more until a 60+kwH EV is being sold for <$30k total upfront price out the door, which is where they need to…

haha. as far as new car tech goes Toyota is okay on adoption. You should see the tech from the past that VW has in its cars.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#15

Post by delusional » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:54 PM UTC

dahfizz wrote: post #7

tharne wrote: post #5

Articles like this misunderstand both innovation and capitalism. Progress isn't typically made by some unusually smart person or enterprise gazing into the future and creating the perfect thing. It happens by lots of individuals and companies making bets and guesses, most of which are wrong, but some turn out the be right. That way the overall system can be brilliant regardless of whether or not the individual actors…

The point of the article isn't "Toyota bet wrong on BEVs, haha they are dumb". The point is "Toyota bet wrong on BEVs, and are now lobbying the government to hinder electric vehicles instead of getting on board".

Or more cynically: "Toyota bet wrong on BEV's, so now they're trying to flip the table before it becomes obvious that they lost".

The system that's supposedly smarter than the actors are under attack by those same actors because they didn't win.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#16

Post by modeless » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:55 PM UTC

tharne wrote: post #5

Articles like this misunderstand both innovation and capitalism. Progress isn't typically made by some unusually smart person or enterprise gazing into the future and creating the perfect thing. It happens by lots of individuals and companies making bets and guesses, most of which are wrong, but some turn out the be right. That way the overall system can be brilliant regardless of whether or not the individual actors…

Hydrogen for cars was an obvious boondoggle for a decade or more. There's making guesses and then there's ignoring obvious trends. Toyota did the latter.

Edit: And to prove that I thought it was obvious a decade ago, here's my opinion from a decade ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3070004

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#17

Post by dekhn » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:55 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #4

My pet theory is that Toyota or Honda will be on life support by the end of next decade, if not dead. They both had a huge head start in batteries with their hybrids (Honda’s first hybrid was released in 1999), and they squandered it. Hopefully the Korean car companies crush them with superior products.

toyota has the best reputation in the entire industry, runs their business tight, and has no real pathway to life support unless they repeatedly failed on every single major initiative, which seems unlikely.

I just bought a RAV4 Prime, it's a plugin hybrid. It looks like they are rolling out HV to their most popular models over the next few years. That gives them everything they need to make EV, HV, or gas vehicles for the forseeable future.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#18

Post by rantwasp » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:56 PM UTC

emadabdulrahim wrote: post #9

tharne wrote: post #5

Articles like this misunderstand both innovation and capitalism. Progress isn't typically made by some unusually smart person or enterprise gazing into the future and creating the perfect thing. It happens by lots of individuals and companies making bets and guesses, most of which are wrong, but some turn out the be right. That way the overall system can be brilliant regardless of whether or not the individual actors…

Why wouldn't companies pay the price for being wrong for far too long? Why don't they suck it up and let the government make decisions that would ease the transition to the future of EV?

what does “being wrong” even mean. Everyone has an opinion and everyone has their own interests (including people in the gov). Assuming they are “wrong”, why would they suck it up? Why would anyone do something that goes directly against their self-interest?

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#19

Post by MelvinButtsESQ » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:57 PM UTC

Production of batteries is the constraint ... previously, currently, and in foreseeable future (Further, given this capacity, the numbers work out such that we are, on the macro level, DRASTICALLY more fuel efficient and environmentally friendly by putting more hybrids and Plug-in Hybrids (which have fewer batteries) on the road than we are by reserving said batteries for fewer pure EVs.

2.5 Priuses are better than 1 EV.

When battery technology and production capacity are NOT the constraint, then pure EV will make sense.

All cars should be mandated hybrid soon (or all manufactures must meet a minimum hybridization level across their line ... sort of like fuel efficiency standards are measured today). All cars should be mandated Plugin Hybrid at some point after that. Maybe someday, we can mandate Pure EV.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#20

Post by Infinitesimus » Wed, Jul 28, 2021, 2:58 PM UTC

typon wrote: post #8

ashtonkem wrote: post #4

My pet theory is that Toyota or Honda will be on life support by the end of next decade, if not dead. They both had a huge head start in batteries with their hybrids (Honda’s first hybrid was released in 1999), and they squandered it. Hopefully the Korean car companies crush them with superior products.

I've pre-ordered an Ioniq 5. Tesla has a real competitor in Hyundai. If you don't care about the "self-driving" thing, other companies are catching up fast.

The ioniq 5 is a great vehicle. If their adaptive cruise control is anything like the current Sonata (that I have) with the new lane changing tech, it'll already go a long way in making highway drives and stop and go traffic a breeze.

Not sure how well HDA 2 (their term for cruise control ) does but the older version doesn't handle sharper turns well and loses the lines briefly. New tech also steers the car out of harm's way like Tesla does so they've come a very long way.