Japan begins to embrace electric cars, Tesla will no longer be “niche”
Toyota, Nissan and Honda have all rolled out new EV strategies
Higher stock price
“The fact that Tesla’s stock price is higher than Toyota’s has greatly boosted its brand awareness in Japan”
The number of EV owners in Japan is increasing day by day. While local EVs account for only 1 percent of overall vehicle sales, well behind China and parts of Europe, they are finally starting to catch up. New registrations of imported electric vehicles nearly tripled to 8,610 in 2021, a small but noticeable change at a time when overall car sales in Japan have stagnated.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk initially thought Tesla and Japan were a “perfect match,” predicting in 2010 that the Asian country would be Tesla’s second-largest market — after the US.
Wary of over betting
However, Japan remains wary of over betting on all-electric vehicles. Japanese automakers and the government prefer to promote hybrid vehicles.
Under international pressure, there now appears to be a turning point. Toyota, Nissan and Honda have all rolled out new electric vehicle strategies as foreign giants from General Motors to Volkswagen pledge to ditch internal combustion engines altogether in the near future.
Japan’s government, which has pledged to be carbon neutral by 2050, also appears to have shifted its focus from defending its domestic auto industry. The country now aims to cut emissions by nearly half from 2013 levels by 2030, and wants to ban the sale of petrol cars by the mid-2030s.
Meanwhile, Japan doubled the amount of subsidies to a maximum of $7,000 in November to make electric cars affordable.
Exciting news
This is exciting news for foreign EV makers. They have long ceded the market to Toyota’s Prius hybrid and Nissan’s Leaf, the world’s first mass-market electric car.
Analysts say Tesla is particularly popular among the young and wealthy in Japan, who live in urban areas with charging stations and appreciate Musk’s maverick.
“The fact that Tesla’s stock price is higher than Toyota has greatly boosted its brand awareness in Japan,” said Seiji Sugiura, an analyst at Tokyo Tokai Research, adding that Tesla has become a status symbol.
IHS Markit estimates Tesla sold more than 5,200 vehicles in Japan in 2021, up from about 1,900 in 2020, but also forecasts a brief pause in sales in 2022 as potential buyers wait for the new Model Y— -It is expected to be launched in Japan around the end of the year.
