Japanese Car Production To Start Mid April. Very Carefully
In the usual show of unity, all three Japanese majors will have at least some production up by mid April. Honda told The Nikkei [sub] today that it will resume auto assembly at its two domestic production plants in Saitama Prefecture, near Tokyo, and Mie Prefecture, western Japan, from April 11.
Just like Toyota, and Nissan Honda will start cautiously and will produce at around 50 percent of its original production plan, and will keep a close eye on the parts supply.
From what we hear behind the scenes, a large part of the restarted production relies on existing or very slowly arriving new parts. Depending on the tenuous parts situation, production can stop at any moment. Supply of stable power is a growing concern. It is generally understood that anything resembling normalcy is not expected before some time in summer.
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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Let's just hope that these Japanese automakers are not recklessly rushing to get production started, otherwise there is going to be some pretty bad long-term implications for the cars that are made under those conditions. I'm talking about reliability, of course.