this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2026
431 points (96.5% liked)

World News

55819 readers
1625 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News !news@lemmy.world

Politics !politics@lemmy.world

World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

And, a recent tour of one of the Asian powerhouse's vehicle plants has proved this beyond a shadow of a doubt, at least to Honda President and CEO Toshihiro Mibe.

"We have no chance against this," Mibe said upon a visit to a Shanghai parts factory, commenting on its seamless automation across all levels of production. Logistics, procurement and all aspects of the process were so automated, in fact, that he did not spot a single human worker on the supplier's floor.

Ford executives saying even three years ago that China was way ahead of the game

Toyota's CEO has likewise said regarding not just his company, but the industry in general, "unless things change, we will not survive"

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Wfh@lemmy.zip 26 points 4 days ago (2 children)

They did. The Honda e was the perfect tiny EV, except for its massive price tag and small-ish range. And of course, in classic Honda fashion, as a promising but flawed attempt didn't succeed immediately, they promptly abandoned the segment instead of capitalizing on acquired knowledge, battery technology advances and price drops. Given how successful the Renault 5 is, I'm pretty sure a 2nd gen e at half the price would have been a massive success.

Of course, being Honda, they changed their mind and came back with a significantly worse SUV.

[–] Humanius@lemmy.world 5 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

They would probably not have managed to slash the price in half with one generation.

The original Honda E was € 35.330 in 2020, which was a difficult sell given the small 170km range.
Half price would mean an electric car for ~€ 18.000

Looking at other Western manufacturers (e.g. Peugeot, Citroen, Volkswagen, Dacia) for a fair comparison, that is a stretch even today. Most EVs don't really go below 20k, and 25k seems to be the current range for affordable EVs.

The issue is largely the cost of the battery. That cost has come down over the years, but not to the extent that Honda could have suddenly slashed the price of their EV in half.

Edit: That is not to say Honda shouldn't have kept releasing more EVs.

I'm just pointing out that they probably would follow the same path as the other Western automakers that have pretty consistently been releasing EVs over the past decade orso.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

The Honda e was the perfect tiny EV, except for its massive price tag and small-ish range.

So it wasn't even close to being perfect was it? Those are like the two most important aspects

[–] ParadoxSeahorse@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago

No perfect in a cute little way