Honda’s new president and chief executive officer, Takahiro Hachigo, has unveiled his future vision for the company with the advancement of a six region, global operation structure, including the start of production in Africa for the first time.
His vision, he said in a speech in Japan on Monday (6 July), revolved around “team Honda”.
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He added: “Honda’s strength is that team/project members share one goal and take on challenges and attain high targets.”
As an assistant large project leader, Hachigo was involved in the development of the US Odyssey, the first full size minivan Honda introduced in North America, together with the start up of a new plant in Alliston, Ontario, Canada.
In 2011, soon after the so-called ‘great east Japan earthquake’, he was appointed general manager of the Suzuka factory, taking on the challenges of integrating development, production and purchasing for domestic market, Kei class mini vehicles. This project resulted in the establishment of SKI (Suzuka K Innovation), a division that promotes Honda’s mini vehicle business which resulted in the success of the N Series, with cumulative sales exceeding 1m units.
Hachigo subsequently became vice president of Honda Motor Europe in the UK and, in 2013, was named the representative of development, purchasing and production at Honda Motor (China) Investment, where he changed the way the carmaker does business with its joint venture partners in China.
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By GlobalDataIn a statement on the Honda website, Hachigo said: “Through my experiences ‘at the spot’, I learned how important it is for each and every associate to share a goal and work as one team. Honda demonstrates its strength when a team is formed that combines the personal qualities of each member.
“The important thing for such a team is opportunities where members can voice their own opinions and have in depth discussions. My role is to build a bottom up environment where teams ‘at the spot’ can take action based on their own initiatives. The goal of Team Honda is to have a strong bond with our customers through challenging products created by such teams ‘at the spot’.”
Currently Honda has a six region, global operations structure under which each territory has built up its own production capacity and established sales, development and purchasing functions, making it possible for each region to develop exclusive models for their markets.
Hachigo said: “As the next step, we will utilise regional production capacity for our global operations as a whole. Operational functions of the global headquarters will be enhanced to strongly promote mutually complementary, inter regional relationships.
“Production allocation will be optimised while leveraging Honda’s flexible production system. Examples of a mutually complementary relationship in the area of automobile production includes the supply of some North American Fit and European Jazz models that will come from Japan, the next generation of Civic five door which will be supplied from Europe [Swindon] to other regions and the next generation of CR-V which will be supplied from Canada to Europe.”
He added that Honda would begin local knock down kit assembly of the Accord in Nigeria this month with planned annual production capacity of 1,000 units.
On future models, Hichago said Honda would continue to be “firmly committed to the creation of challenging products”. The next generation Civic would be built on a new platform with downsized turbocharged engine while the core global models – CR-V and Accord – would be completely redesigned with more new technology, higher competitiveness and innovative design.
“We will strive to begin sales in Japan of the next-generation successor to [the Clarity fuel cell vehicle] before the end of the current fiscal year (ending 31 March, 2016). [For the next generation] of mobility products, Honda will evolve [models] that use electricity as a core technology.”
The automaker, he added, would continue its research and development of a Walking Assist Device which supports walking for people with weakened leg strength. Honda is hoping to commercialise this product in Japan before the end of this year.
See also: Honda Swindon plant to export Type R to Japan
