Welcome To The Daihatsu Playhouse!

Edward Niedermeyer
by Edward Niedermeyer
welcome to the daihatsu playhouse

Between Suzuki’s decision to show off its latest Tokyo Auto Show concepts and Scion’s possible collaboration with Daihatsu, now seems like a good time to show you Toyota’s kei car partner’s latest trinkets. From the fuel cell-powered, Tokyo-apartment-on-wheels, the FC Sho-Case (above), to the sweet little turbo-two-pot roadster, the D-X, Daihatsu’s got every kind of future vehicle you might possibly want… as long as it’s small and strange. They’re even taking on BMW’s see-through “i” brand, with the Pico, a semi-transparent plug-in. Because your car could always be a little smaller, weirder and more Japanese…



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  • PJ McCombs PJ McCombs on Nov 10, 2011

    Looks like a drivable version of the Lego cars I put together as a kid. Or a moon rover (does the side-hinged door have a 'dry-ice/hiss effect' option?). In either case, cool stuff.

  • JuniorMint JuniorMint on Nov 10, 2011

    I would love a Scion "collaboration" with Daihatsu (doesn't Toyota own Daihatsu already? collaboration is an interesting term for that). I cite that Japan got a bB replacement I would actually purchase, where we got the sales-killing xB2 and the xD. And of course global corporations should run on my whims and desires. In any case, getting back to Scion's roots (small, cheap, efficient and freakishly bizarre in every way) seems to be the only hope left for the brand.

  • William I think it's important to understand the factors that made GM as big as it once was and would like to be today. Let's roll back to 1965, or even before that. GM was the biggest of the Big Three. It's main competition was Ford and Chrysler, as well as it's own 5 brands competing with themselves. The import competition was all but non existent. Volkswagen was the most popular imported cars at the time. So GM had its successful 5 brands, and very little competition compared to today's market. GM was big, huge in fact. It was diversified into many other lines of business, from trains to information data processing (EDS). Again GM was huge. But being huge didn't make it better. There are many examples of GM not building the best cars they could, it's no surprise that they were building cars to maximize their profits, not to be the best built cars on the road, the closest brand to achieve that status was Cadillac. Anyone who owned a Cadillac knew it could have been a much higher level of quality than it was. It had a higher level of engineering and design features compared to it's competition. But as my Godfather used to say "how good is good?" Being as good as your competitors, isn't being as good as you could be. So, today GM does not hold 50% of the automotive market as it once did, and because of a multitude of reasons it never will again. No matter how much it improves it's quality, market value and dealer network, based on competition alone it can't have a 50% market share again. It has only 3 of its original 5 brands, and there are too many strong competitors taking pieces of the market share. So that says it's playing in a different game, therfore there's a whole new normal to use as a baseline than before. GM has to continue downsizing to fit into today's market. It can still be big, but in a different game and scale. The new normal will never be the same scale it once was as compared to the now "worlds" automotive industry. Just like how the US railroad industry had to reinvent its self to meet the changing transportation industry, and IBM has had to reinvent its self to play in the ever changing Information Technology industry it finds it's self in. IBM was once the industry leader, now it has to scale it's self down to remain in the industry it created. GM is in the same place that the railroads, IBM and other big companies like AT&T and Standard Oil have found themselves in. It seems like being the industry leader is always followed by having to reinvent it's self to just remain viable. It's part of the business cycle. GM, it's time you accept your fate, not dead, but not huge either.
  • Tassos The Euro spec Taurus is the US spec Ford FUSION.Very few buyers care to see it here. FOrd has stopped making the Fusion long agoWake us when you have some interesting news to report.
  • Marvin Im a current owner of a 2012 Golf R 2 Door with 5 grand on the odometer . Fun car to drive ! It's my summer cruiser. 2006 GLI with 33,000 . The R can be money pit if service by the dealership. For both cars I deal with Foreign car specialist , non union shop but they know their stuff !!! From what I gather the newer R's 22,23' too many electronic controls on the screen, plus the 12 is the last of the of the trouble free ones and fun to drive no on screen electronics Maze !
  • VoGhost It's very odd to me to see so many commenters reflexively attack an American company like this. Maybe they will be able to find a job with BYD or Vinfast.
  • VoGhost I'm clearly in the minority here, but I think this is a smart move. Apple is getting very powerful, and has slowly been encroaching on the driving experience over the last decade. Companies like GM were on the verge of turning into mere hardware vendors to the Apple brand. "Is that a new car; what did you get?" "I don't remember. But it has the latest Apple OS, which is all I care about." Taking back the driving experience before it was too late might just be GM's smartest move in a while.
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