Sony Honda Mobility Inc. is the new name of Sony Group Corporation and Honda Motor Co., Ltd.’s new independent joint EV partnership. The company will be established in Tokyo by the end of 2022, with EV sales beginning in 2025. Automated driving will surely be a part of the new vehicle line-up.
Both companies have an equal 50% share, while Honda executive Yasuhide Mizuno will be the CEO, and Sony’s Izumi Kawanishi, the president and COO. As said by Honda in the press release, the new partnership will make use of: “Honda’s cutting edge environmental and safety technologies, mobility development capabilities, vehicle body manufacturing technology, and after-sales service management experience.“, while Sony will contribute to “Imaging, sensing, telecommunication, network, and entertainment technologies.”
Honda is still behind other EV manufacturers, as the Honda E is the only electric car they produce. However, as Honda unveiled a new partnership with GM earlier this year, it is expected that the Honda and Acura SUVs will enter the North American market by 2024. Also, Honda announced plans for a complete transition towards electric and fuel-cell vehicles by 2040 by investing $40 billion in the EV sector and launching 30 new EVs by 2030.
On the other hand, Sony expressed an interest in electric vehicles back in 2020. The company has already shown two own electric vehicles by far, the electric sedan concept Vision-S EV revealed at the CES in Las Vegas in 2020, built in a correlation with the Canadian Magna International Inc., and Vision-S 02 SUV in 2022. However, as Sony’s CFO stated that Sony would not make batteries or vehicles by itself, it is clear that they will focus on building partnerships.
It is expected from both parties that this new 10 billion yen ($74,083,950) joint venture agreement between Sony and Honda will revolutionize mobility and inspire and excite the customers.
More details are still not publicly available. It is therefore still unknown on which platform the new vehicles will be built, or how the vehicles will be branded.
