Last March, Sony and Honda, in a surprising coming together, announced an alliance to design, build, and sell new EV models. The new company was not given a name and not much details emerged out of it.
Today, the two companies revealed that the new company is named Sony Honda Mobility Inc and will be established in Tokyo before the end of 2022, with EV sales set to start in 2025.
But beyond these two details, nothing much emerged today, too.
The new company, not surprisingly, hopes to leverage on the established expertise of the two Japanese giants. As a dense statement from them said, "the new company will aim to bring together Honda’s cutting-edge environmental and safety technologies, mobility development capabilities, vehicle body manufacturing technology and after-sales service management experience with Sony’s expertise in the development and application of imaging, sensing, telecommunication, network and entertainment technologies, to realize a new generation of mobility and services for mobility that are closely aligned with users and the environment, and continue to evolve going forward."
As you can see, the statement is broadbased without any specifics. Quite in line what the two companies have been doling out after the announcement of their joint venture.
Honda to manufacture, Sony to develop platform
Kenichiro Yoshida, Representative Corporate Executive Officer, Chairman, President and CEO, Sony Group Corporation said: "Based on our vision to ‘make the mobility space an emotional one,’ Sony’s initiatives in the mobility business are centered around the three areas of safety, entertainment and adaptability."
Yasuhide Mizuno, Representative Director, Chairman and CEO of Sony Honda Mobility Inc. (Planned) and Senior Managing Officer of Honda Motor said: "We plan to fully leverage the technological assets the two companies possess in different fields, such as Sony’s sensing technology and Honda’s original mobility development capabilities, to realize mobility and services that inspire and excite our customers."
At the time of announcement in March, Sony and Honda said that the new company is expected to plan, design, develop, and sell the EVs, but not own and operate manufacturing facilities. Honda is expected to be responsible for manufacturing the first EV model at its vehicle manufacturing plant. It is also expected that a mobility service platform will be developed by Sony and made available for the new company.
The two aim to provide high-value-added EVs, but it is not known if Sony's Vision-S 01 sedan and Vision-S 02 crossover have anything to do with the new EVs from the two companies.
Honda, for its part, has a separate understanding with General Motors to co-develop 'a series of affordable electric vehicles based on a new global architecture using next-generation Ultium battery technology'.
Hond and GM with their budget offerings, which plan to compete against Tesla and others, have targeted a global production of millions of EVs starting in 2027, including compact crossover vehicles.
