December 29, 2023

Japan To Fight Back Against Advancing Chinese Car Brands By Investing Big In ASEAN Production


To slow the advancement of Chinese carmakers’ influence in Southeast Asia, Japan and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have vowed to work together to create a competitive and green automotive industry.

Agreed to at a summit in Tokyo, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida outlined what they call the ASEAN-Japan Co-Creation Initiative for the Next-Generation Automotive Industry. The objective of the new program is to ensure that ASEAN remains a central production and export hub, specifically for Japanese car brands.

The agreed-upon path calls for jointly developing a “master plan” for the auto industry, covering policies including the de-carbonization of the entire value chain and building resilient and reliable supply chains.

For more than 50 years, Japanese automakers have been maintaining production bases in countries such as Thailand and Indonesia. However, as the auto industry transitions to cleaner technologies such as battery electric vehicles (BEVs), ASEAN countries have been eager to seize the opportunity; something the bloc of countries have in common with China.

The emergence of these so-called New Energy Vehicles poses a challenge for Japan. Chinese brands have expanded their footprint in Southeast Asia in recent years. The share of Japanese cars in the ASEAN market dropped to 73 percent, a four percent drop between 2019 to 2022, according to Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry.

In Thailand, for example, Japanese automakers have pledged to invest 150 billion baht (USD 4.3 billion) over the next five years. Toyota and Honda will invest about 50 billion baht each, while Isuzu will invest 30 billion baht, and Mitsubishi about 20 billion baht. The move will include making that country the production base for electric pickup trucks.

12 comments:

  1. Too late. Japs cars has been taking advantage of buyers by selling overpriced unsespecced undefeatures cars for 50years. People are taking notice and are making the switch. Tides have changed.The dominance of chinese cars have caused a giant dent on their sales worldwide which hurt them so bad.
    Even BYD has overtaken tesla as the no.1 EV in the world today. The recent toyota fiasco adds salt to the mix. Its a slippery slope for japs cars to even the battle field.

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    1. Too late...??? Google the top 10 auto brand world wide sales and then say that again. in china they are making in roads but in the rest of other countries they are so KULELAT, except in russia which was abandoned by japz,kpop and west car brands.

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    2. China is the top car manufacturer in the world.

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    3. China produced and sold 26M commercial and passenger vehicles since 2021. Thats more than all the japanese and euro brands sold put together.

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    4. 26M but most of it are foreign brands and not homegrown china car brands.

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    5. None of china home grown car brands in 2020, 2021, 2022 top 10 car brands by units sold world wide(toyota #1). No china home grown car brands either on top 10 sales by model(dominated by toyota models). But byd could enter top 10 2023

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    6. Grabe talaga mag mislead ang mga chinese car lovers.

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    7. Google is your friend.

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  2. Japan need to counter China's BYD in making cheaper and efficient EV batteries. I think this is the most significant challenge being faced by Japanese automotive industry including western countries.

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  3. Chinese vehicles especially SUVs,EVs and trucks are much better and value for money
    Foton owns an assembly plant in the Philippines

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  4. Toyota chairman koji recently announced that EVs are scam.
    Toyota is not going EV fullblast. How can they compete with the chinese??

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    1. Toyota dominates hybrid sales and now on full throttle on EV'S. to fastrack its EV's deployment they are now using LG batteries while still developing its own battery tech.

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