Honda does not scale back the development of electric vehicles, but considers hybrids as a medium-term measure – CEO Mibe – paultan.org

In May, Honda announced it would scale back its investment plans for pure electric vehicles as part of a strategy realignment, cutting its R&D budget for electric models from 10 trillion yen (RM264 billion) to 7 trillion yen (RM185 billion), with some of the money saved going towards hybrid powertrains. It also revised its goal of making 30% of sales from electric vehicles by 2030.

Despite this and the subsequent cancellation of a three-row EV SUV aimed at the US market, electrification continued to feature prominently in the automaker’s presentation at the recent Japan Mobility Show 2025, with the 0 Series sedan and SUV sharing the stage with the new 0 α (Alpha) SUV study, which took center stage alongside the Super-One EV prototype.

So how does all this equate to a reduction in focus, and more importantly, where do hybrids stand in the scheme of things? According to Honda president and representative Toshihiro Mibe, both electric cars and hybrid vehicles are an integral part of the company, although the direction in which they are approached differs somewhat.

During an interview after the show, he reiterated to Asia Pacific press what he said earlier this year about the brand not abandoning its EV path. “It’s not really that we’re scaling back the development of full battery electric cars. We’re just saying that the value compared to our initial forecast should be lower than we previously anticipated,” he said.

“The EV market is slowing down. But if you look at the medium or long-term perspective, for a solution to CO2 neutrality, EVs are still the optimal solution, we believe. Our thinking on that remains unchanged. We are just reviewing and revising the models and their value, so we will still continue to look at EVs and work on them,” he added.

However, hybrids will play a role in ensuring bridging and continuity. “Although EV volume is not growing, we will increase the volume of hybrid vehicles during that time. By 2030, we plan to exceed two million units of hybrid vehicles. Until 2030, I believe hybrid vehicles will form the bulk of our business for our company, and for battery vehicles we will continue our R&D activities during that time,” Mibe said.

“We will continue to develop hybrids. We have a plan to offer the evolved version of the mid-size hybrid in 2027, with a completely new system for that. We also have research and development activities for a large hybrid. Once that is done, we can have hybrids of all sizes, from compact and small to medium and large, and they will continue to evolve in the future,” he said.

Mibe said the hybrid path is easier to navigate simply because this is an area the automaker has many years of experience in. “We have been doing this for over 25 years, which means that we have sufficient expertise and know-how when it comes to hybrid vehicles. So without expenditure, especially extraordinary development costs, we can leverage our expertise, while keeping the required investments low, and develop models from it,” he explains.

According to Mibe, expansion is possible within this specific field. “We will continue to develop hybrids suitable for every market. Somewhere between hybrids and electric cars there could also be room for the plug-in hybrid, I think,” Mibe ventured.

“If plug-in hybrids are needed between hybrids and electric vehicles, we can develop them as quickly as necessary. Our twin-motor hybrid systems (e:HEV) are equipped with a traction motor and a generator motor, so it is not difficult at all to evolve them into the plug-in hybrid,” he added.

In terms of research and development, Mibe said the company was working on the next generation of electrified platforms and would continue to introduce new technologies to further develop them.

“These will be new technologies that we can bring to the market in the future, the evolved version of these platforms. It is our wish that the electric vehicle sector will be large enough to be equivalent to today’s ICE (internal combustion engines) business,” he concluded.

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