This is why Toyota is the #1 automaker on the planet and will likely remain so for the next decade. This dovetails nicely with their strategy of evolution, not revolution. They've spent 30 years perfecting the hybrid drivetrain. Their current generation of hybrids are more gasoline-oriented vehicles. As they develop their EV platform they're going to transition to being more EV-oriented vehicles. Meanwhile, this gives several battery technologies that are in the pipeline a chance to mature.
Japan has invested heavily in hydrogen energy, across multiple sectors. It makes sense for a Japanese automotive manufacturer to research hydrogen-powered vehicles. They probably received a lot of government research money to do so.
Though people may not be familiar with it, Toyota does have a commercial truck division. Hydrogen power makes a lot of sense in that market. Whenever you hear about Toyota making improvements in hydrogen engines - think commercial trucks and industrial engines such as bulldozers, end loaders, etc.
The bottom line is personal transportation is being electrified, but that's not "settled science" in the commercial and industrial sectors.
I predict that Toyota is likely to get steamrolled by BYD, who already employs twice as many workers as Toyota. China already produces enough battery cells to put a 50kw pack in every vehicle built, and manufacturing capacity continues to increase.
China has a local market 5-10x pretty much everywhere else, a huge trade surplus, the ability to borrow tech and people from around the world, a cheap labour base, and massive government incentive to dominate a new industry.
Anyone doubting China will steamroll most markets given the current situation is in for a shock.
Australia has already experienced China weaponising trade (banning wine and beef imports). Other small countries will experience similar.
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not - Toyota is widely considered to have pioneered hybrid technologies and then completely squandered whatever technical lead they had.
Their main EV at the moment is awful in terms of basic EV efficiency and value wise it's not competitive with anything, it's like it's made by someone who has 0 experience with EV building and it's really hurting Toyota to have such a weird product out - I'd ask who is actually buying these.
Sorry maybe my point isn't clear - Toyota has literally 30 years of experience building automotive EV motors(for their hybrid cars) and their first real EV has half the efficiency of a Tesla. So where is that 30 years of experience that Toyota has?
And just to go back to hybrids - Toyota was such a pioneer in what we call "mild" hybrids nowadays, but they were super late on the PHEV side, for years you could buy PHEVs from different manufacturers before Toyota finally made one.
Well, just a data point: I'll probably need to get a new car in the next 2 years, I've been looking at EVs and PHEVs and they simply don't make sense for my usage.
Maybe Toyota is trying to sell to me not to you...
That's fine, but the point is that they make hybrids and EVs so I don't see why we shouldn't discuss their engineering details regardless of whether me and you are personally interested in buying them.
>their first real EV has half the efficiency of a Tesla.
Which model is Toyota's first real EV? The BZ4X efficiency (131 city/107 hwy MPGe), while less than the Model 3 (138 city/126 hwy MPGe), isn't half the efficiency.
Top Gear averaged 2.7 miles/kWh over 10k miles[0], while a Tesla Model 3 and Y can easily do 4-5 miles/kWh in real life tests. TBF 2.7 is abysmal in any car, that's numbers from a Q8 E-Tron, a big heavy SUV, for a small crossover that's just not ok.
Thanks, that's very interesting. Does Top Gear have a similar long term review for a Tesla model (with the average efficiency calculated over something like the 10,000 miles in the Toyota review and presumably with the same group of drivers/environmental conditions/mix of highway/city driving)? You are correct that the 2.7 miles/kwh is low. But I suppose it isn't too far off the EPA estimate of 107 MPGe (highway rating), which would be 3.175 miles/kwh.
BEVs and hybrids use the same electric motor technology. All I'm saying is that it's shocking(to me anyway) that Toyota spent 30 years making millions of them and then they can't match half the efficiency of a Tesla, that's just weird and makes you wonder where is all that engineering experience gone.
You may be building a straw man. None of your criticisms may be valid as they attempt to discredit Toyota for strategic decisions it didn't make, precisely because these decisions would not align with its operating philosophy which has allowed them to become one of the most valuable brands and emulated models in history.
You might be right of course, I've just replied to a comment which was giving such an unconditional praise to Toyota it read almost like sarcasm - by all accounts they were super late with key technologies when it comes to hybrids, which is just weird given their very long experience building cars like the Prius. The EV point was purely about the fact that IMHO their first EV should have been super strong given their experience and it's just.....awfully unerwhelming.
I agree however that this lateness probably didn't hurt their brand that much though, and long long term they will be fine.
Kudos! This is a brilliant strategy!