Recently in Toyota Category

Nokia has announced that they plan to launch an MVNO with Docomo using their Vertu brand in Japan.

A quick look at this brings up many more questions than answers. Vodafone failed spectacularly in Japan just a few years ago, and without careful understanding of the Japan market, Vertu/Nokia will fail as well. Masayoshi Son was the major benefactor of the failed Vodafone Japan effort.

I think Vertu in Japan needs to understand why these efforts failed in Japan:

- Toyota's Lexus brand
- Sony's Qualia brand

Lexus did well in the US because the US Toyota dealership experience was so horrendous for customers that they were happy to pay more for a much better dealer experience AND the products had a premium that was not as high as the German competition but was as good as they expected of a Japanese manufacturer. Affordable luxury. In Japan, the dealer experience is much more uniform so that is not a competitive edge, and for Japanese car buyers, Lexus is a domestic brand, it does not have the cachet of a foreign brand like BMW or Audi. We all know that the Lexus RX and the Toyota Harrier are the same vehicle, the GS is a gussied up Toyota Crown, the IS is a gussied up Toyota Altezza, etc.

Sony's Qualia effort was doomed from the start, even if the idea may have been a good one. The products were roundly derided as being poorer feature-sets for the outrageous prices that were being demanded.

Unless Vertu has a whole new line of phones designed just for the Japanese market, they'll fail via product, as Vodafone did. And even if Vertu has a whole new line of phones for Japan, it's incredibly poor timing to launch a premium-anything in Japan. Maybe if the target market is the top 10,000 richest people in Japan, but how valuable is that market really?

More competition in Japan's mobile market is very welcome, but I don't see clearly Nokia's strategy wrt a Vertu-based MVNO in Japan. If anyone can convince me otherwise, I'm all ears.

UPDATE: on my way home yesterday I was wondering how Disney Japan is doing with their MVNO with Softbank but since the target demographic is so different from what Vertu wants to do, I don't think there are many lessons to be learned.

I used to work at Toyota, so I keep my eye on them for nostalgia's sake, less and less so these days.

Watanabe's recent moves to align Toyota with both Isuzu and Subaru are going to be important in the long run.

More experience with diesels will be important as well. Diesel has a horrible image in Japan whereas clean/new tech diesels are all over Europe.

Low-Key Chief Asserts Himself as a Leader at Toyota - New York Times

DSC00756.JPG, originally uploaded by quanza.

If I was very wealthy, I'd own one of these.

It's been a number of years since I worked in the Auto industry (I worked at Toyota USA in IT) but I keep my eye on the industry.

Seems like the Japanese are still creating vehicles that US drivers want.

The Japanese handily dominated the 2006 APEAL results, garnering wins in 12 of the 19 segments - including a tie between the Lexus GX470 and Porsche Cayenne in the Midsize Premium MAV category.

Detroit manufacturers captured only two of 19 segments. Ford's wildly popular Mustang was tops in the Midsize Sporty Car segment, while the automaker's new Fusion was best Midsize Car. Significantly, Japanese makers won or tied in every single truck and crossover category, the side of the market that Detroit manufacturers have traditional dominated. On the other hand, it has been years since the Big Three were able to field truly competitive passenger cars, an area of their business Detroit makers are vowing to revitalize.

Porsche Tops APEAL Study - The Car Connection

Having worked at Toyota in the US for 4 years, I'm disappointed but not necessarily surprised.

Japanese managers, even executives transferred to the US, forget that they are in America and not Japan.

If Ms. Kobayashi's story is true, and it rings true for me even just from this relatively short article, it will be an expensive but important lesson for Toyota and TMS.

Sexual harassment in the workplace in Japan is a whole other story that I won't cover here.

Toyota Official Is on Leave After Harassment Charge - New York Times

Drifting is another data point to support the "Cool Japan" thesis.

Since that first parking-lot event, Irwindale has offered events and exhibitions by the top Japanese drifters, including the 2004 Formula Drift Grand Prix in August, which drew a standing-room-only crowd of more than 8,000.

In the final round of Formula Drift, Dai was pitted against Rhys Millen for the top prize. Mr. Millen, a former world-rally car driver, and his car have shaken up the American drifting scene this year.

Dai learned to drift in the Japanese mountains, where the sport began. His Nissan Silvia is a favorite of Japanese drifters, a rear-wheel-drive compact car with an engine tweaked to add horsepower. General Motors sponsors Mr. Millen. His Pontiac GTO, with its growling V-8 engine and bright orange-yellow paint job, has been a lightning rod in drifting as people struggle with the idea of allowing big American metal to compete against traditional Japanese sport-compact cars.
...
The sport's backers say that drifting, American style, has the opportunity to marry the grass-roots appeal it has in Japan with American commercialism. Drifting is still new enough, however, that a great driver can come from anywhere and take a championship. That is the dream for many drivers taking to the Irwindale track.

Previous posts on the topic of Cool Japan are here:

July 2003 - Cool Japan Marches on

Aug. 2003 - Is Japan Cool?

Dec. 2003 - Japan's empire of cool

Darwin at work.

People driving or riding in a sport utility vehicle in 2003 were nearly 11 percent more likely to die in an accident than people in cars, the figures show.
...
The traffic safety agency reported last week that there were 16.42 deaths of S.U.V. occupants in accidents last year for every 100,000 registered S.U.V.'s. The figure for passenger cars was 14.85 deaths for each 100,000 registered; pickups were slightly higher than cars at 15.17 deaths per 100,000, while vans were lowest at 11.2 occupant deaths for every 100,000 registered.

My god... if you drive an F150, you ought to reconsider it immediately. This is so incredibly horrible.

Crash Testing: MINI Cooper vs Ford F150

Toyota seems unstoppable these days.

...Toyota reported $10.2 billion in earnings for its latest fiscal year, which ended in March, the most ever made in a single year by a Japanese company.

Toyota made more than General Motors, Ford Motor and DaimlerChrysler combined. In fact, its earnings were more than double the combined earnings of those companies in their most recent fiscal years.

The Big Three Fear That Toyota Is Becoming the Big One

WOW. Toyota's newest hybrid is a sports car, with 408 horsepower, 100 km/liter, 0-100km in 4 seconds, 3 seat, carries both an electric engine and a 3.3L V6, designed by Giugiaro/ItalDesign.

AutoWeek - 2004 Geneva: Hybrid-powered Toyota coupe has Italian flair