Honda Motor Co., Ltd. Director, President and Representative, Toshihiro Mibe held a press conference today, at the JAPAN MOBILITY SHOW 2023.
Following is a summary of his formal remarks:
What used to be the Tokyo Motor Show is now “reborn” as the JAPAN MOBILITY SHOW, which will offer an exciting look into the future of not only cars and motorcycles, but a broader range of mobility products, services and technologies.
Honda is a company that started off with motorcycles, but has been expanding the lineup of its mobility products to include automobiles, and now aircraft and more. In light of the evolution of the “Tokyo Motor Show” into the “JAPAN MOBILITY SHOW,” at the Honda booth, we will be exhibiting not only automobiles but diverse forms of current and future mobility that Honda is pursuing.
We offer visitors the opportunity to experience the future mobility Honda dreams of, and also to participate in creating the future mobility with us.
This year, Honda is celebrating its 75th anniversary. When we look back on our history of offering a wide range of value to our customers and society as a manufacturer of mobility products, we can say that Honda has grown to this point while always being driven by “dreams,” and taking on challenges to realize what was thought to be impossible.
The Power of Dreams – How we move you. – This is the Honda Global Brand Slogan, which conveys the message that the dreams of each and every one working at Honda have always been the driving force of Honda, and a variety of mobility products and services Honda creates with such power of dreams will move people physically, move people’s hearts, and help many people realize their dreams so that there will be an expanse of dreams toward the future.
We picked the “Honda Dream Loop” as our booth theme to express the future, toward which the dreams of many people will form an endless loop and continue expanding, starting from mobility products and services that embody Honda’s dreams.
The mobility products and services that embody Honda’s dreams will enable people to “transcend various constraints such as time and place,” and to “augment their abilities and possibilities.” Those two are essential values of all types of mobility products and services Honda has been offering for the past 75 years since its founding, and the value Honda wants to continue offering now and in the future.
Mobility enables us to see new surroundings, meet new people and discover new things, which expands the world we live in. On the other hand, mobility faces various constraints. It may take a long time just to get to the destination, and we often cannot do anything else during that time. Or, we cannot even get to some places due to a lack of the proper means of transportation. Honda wants to enable people to transcend such constraints, and we want to continue offering the joy and freedom of mobility into the future.
By using new mobility products and services at the will of the user, we can go faster and farther. We can go to places where we cannot get to only with human ability. New mobility products and services will enable people to do things that were not possible before. That is the value of “augmenting people’s possibilities.”
At the Honda booth, we are exhibiting various mobility products and technologies which will enable people to “transcend various constraints such as time and place,” and to “augment their abilities and possibilities.” Let me introduce some of them.
Mobility products and services enable people to transcend various constraints such as time, place and limited resources
Since the interior space of this vehicle can be completely private, the users can use their travel time more freely, such as holding a meeting or having a fun time with the family without worrying about other people around them. This vehicle will indeed let us transcend the constraints of time. Time is an absolute constraint for most people. Mobility products and services which enable people to use the limited time given equally to all people – 24 hours a day, 365 days a year – more efficiently for more meaningful things, will offer a tremendous value for people.
Together with GM and Cruise, Honda is planning to launch a driverless ridehail service using the Cruise Origin, in Japan in early 2026.
When we can combine these aircraft with mobility systems on the ground and enable people to travel more freely and seamlessly on the ground, in the ocean and in the skies, the hurdles people face in long-distance traveling will be lowered. This would make it easier for people to live in a nature-rich suburban area and work in the cities only when necessary. This could be described as “transcending the constraints of place and distance.” This three-dimensional and seamless mobility will help people live more enjoyable lives with better work-life balance.
Mobility products are made from a variety of materials, including metals, resins and fabrics. However, these materials and resources are limited. If we only use current ways of making products and recycling, there will, sooner or later, come a time when it will become difficult to sustain our production of mobility products.
This SUSTAINA-C Concept is a car made of acrylic resin that is recycled and reused. This kind of resource circulation will enable us to transcend the constraints of the limited availability of resources, and achieve both environmental sustainability and the joy and freedom of mobility long into the future.
Mobility products designed to augment people’s abilities and possibilities
By logging in and remotely controlling Honda Avatar Robot in a distant location, we can perform tasks and experience things remotely as if we are there in person. The use of Honda Avatar Robot will enable all people, including those who have limited mobility due to various constraints, to play active roles from a remote location. And this UNI-ONE is a mobility device the user can steer simply by shifting their body weight while sitting without using hands and thus perform certain tasks while moving. The UNI-ONE will expand opportunities for users with mobility challenges.
As people get older, driving and walking might become difficult. And there are people who live in areas where no public transportation is available. Such people tend to have a limited living radius. If there are products that offer easily-accessible, last-mile mobility, people can go places, farther, faster and more casually. And if everyone can enjoy mobility more freely and expand their living radius, they will have more chance to meet new people, which we believe will augment people’s possibilities.
I could only introduce so many, but there are many other items on display at the Honda booth, please enjoy looking at all of them, which represent the future Honda envisions!
At this year’s Honda booth, we are not only showcasing the future mobility Honda dreams of. We would like to invite visitors to our website or at the booth to participate in our Dream Loop.
At Honda, we began using generative AI to support the ability of our designers to demonstrate their creativity. At this Japan Mobility Show, generative AI will generate design drawings of future mobility you dream of and project them on the “Loop Screen” inside our booth.
My dream is to realize a world where mobility products bearing the Honda logo are traveling all around the world, on the ground, in the ocean, in the skies and into outer space, and people are enjoying the true freedom of mobility. So, let me input ideas of my dream mobility.
Like mine, your dream mobility will be visualized. We are thinking that, after the Show, we will select a few and have Honda designers work on them. Please come visit the Honda booth and have fun drawing your dream mobility.
I have introduced some of the mobility products that embody Honda’s dreams, which represent the Honda of today and the future. But we know our customers are expecting one more thing from Honda, and that is sports models.
At the automobile electrification business briefing we held last year, I talked about future sports models. Today, to conclude my presentation, I would like to show you one of them – the specialty sports model.
Everyone, this is the Prelude Concept.
Honda has always been committed to creating sporty vehicles. And the word “prelude” means an “introductory or preceding performance.” This model will become the prelude for our future models which will inherit the “joy of driving” into the full-fledged electrified future and embody Honda’s unalterable sports mindset. The Prelude Concept is a specialty sports model that will offer exhilarating experience that makes you want to keep going forever and extraordinary excitement you never felt before.
In order to offer the “joy of driving” only Honda can realize, we are diligently progressing with development, so please keep your expectations high for this model.
We are exhibiting many types of future mobility Honda dreams of. So, please see and feel the future dreams of Honda. And we hope that you will express your dreams and desires for better mobility and join us in expanding our dreams for the future.
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