Honda to spend $11B on four EV factories in North America

From the look of the honda prologue, it's by building EVs that appear simple and plain. Which I think is probably a pretty good strategy.

I think Honda's brand is a genuine advantage. They know how to make good cars, and people trust them as a result.

I'm in my 40s, but still only on my second car, which is an old Honda Civic. I plan to drive it until I can purchase a second- or third-gen EV Civic. (Surely Honda eventually plans to make an EV Civic?)

I still think their early investment in hybrids was a great strategy.

If you look at the graph to the right on the link below, hybrids are still edging out battery EVs, although the trend lines are definitely in favor of battery EVs long term.

https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=61344

Guessing hybrids / plug ins will be popular for a long time, just because they are a known quantity.

Kia and Hyundai still haven’t reached the rock solid reliability of Japanese autos, despite having been around for much longer than Tesla.

Traditional manufacturers will likely have an easier time transitioning to EVs than EV manufacturers will, building reliable cars.

Quality still matters. Ask anybody with a Tesla.

I think Honda will be fine. Toyota has lots of time as well I think as car buyers have a certain amount of brand loyalty.

If it were not for brand loyalty and emotional bias, BYD would probably be storming the world with their inexpensive EV options.

Tesla is in the biggest trouble I think. They have been a luxury brand despite a total lack of luxury. Once everybody catches up on EV range, what do they have? The charging network is the biggest advantage. Perhaps they should pivot to dominating that. Probably harder to avoid regulatory break-up on that front though I suppose.

There is not much battery risk these days though and less all the time. At some point, the problem for car makers is going to be that the batteries last too long.

With mechanical parts, nobody faults you if things start to fail after a decade or two. What will the car market look like when cars start maintaining peak performance for decades?

Most buy batteries elsewhere. China already sells 1 million mile battery.

Sounds like they’ll need to try making actually good cars.

There will still be more and less reliable EVs, even if they are more reliable in absolute terms.

Drive units and stuff like charging controllers are just about the same reliability as gasoline engines and transmissions. I think that batteries are probably the most reliable part of the car.

To mark the occasion, here is a cheque from the government for $40 billion.