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Honda exec says US market near capacity, could hurt subprime buyers

Is there a point in the US auto industry where companies should start considering the welfare of their customers ahead of selling more cars? American Honda Executive Vice President of Sales John Mendel thinks that level exists, and we may be getting very close to it.
According to Automotive News, Mendel believes that finding more customers in the market could require pursuing subprime buyers and offering longer-term loans. However, he refuses to use those tactics. While selling models this way can improve things briefly, the strategies hurt resale prices and lower vehicle profits over time. The company won't do "stupid things in the short-term that damage the person who bought yesterday," he said to Automotive News. "It's a very, very short-term tactic especially in the subprime area."
American Honda, which combines the Acura and Honda brands, has seen market share decline from 9.7 percent to 9.1 percent through July 2014, according to Automotive News, and Autoblog's By the Numbers stats showed it posted falling sales in five of the seven months with data this year. Though, Mendel claims that was partially because the company focused on retail sales over fleets. The delays of the launches for the Honda Fit and Acura TLX likely didn't help either.

Honda's electric 0 Series: 5 things we learned at CES 2024

LAS VEGAS — After Honda announced its new all-electric 0 Series at CES this week, suffice it to say we had questions. Fortunately for us, Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe was there to share the news in person. Along with other selected media, we had the opportunity to ask anything we liked about the forthcoming platform and Honda's plans for its rollout here in the United States starting in 2026. Here are five key things we learned about this new platform and the cars it will underpin.  We may see one before the Saloon arrives in 2026 While Honda has promised it will launch a production model based on the 'Saloon' concept in North America in 2026, another 0 Series vehicle may actually arrive at the same time — or even sooner. What form that may take is anybody's guess, as Mibe remained shy about the details. For now, treat 2026 as the hard deadline and rule nothing out. It will expand to new segments At launch, 0 Series will be a "mid-large" platform, which we can take to mean midsize for practical purposes. This would support cars of equivalent size to Honda's existing Accord and Passport along with the Odyssey minivan (take a close look at that Space Hub concept below). Honda plans to offer 0 Series models with different footprints later. A small-car platform suitable for subcompact, midcompact and compact offerings (think Honda City, HR-V, Civic, CR-V, etc.) will follow later, as will an even larger platform, which we would expect to be utilized for a Pilot equivalent. Though the existing ICE-powered Pilot and its other sibling, the Ridgeline are midsizers riding on the same platform as the aforementioned Passport, these are as big as Honda's trucks and crossovers get. If the mid-large platform could accommodate such offerings, it stands to reason that a larger one wouldn't be necessary.  It has not damaged Honda's relationship with GM Mibe dismissed any perceived rift between Honda and General Motors resulting from the dissolution of their agreement to build a line of small cars on GM's Ultium EV platform. The companies parted ways over a desire to approach their long-term electrification strategies differently, not over any technological limitations or constraints provided by the Ultium platform itself, Mibe said, and the two companies are still working together to develop autonomous technology utilizing elements of GM's Cruise division.

Honda updates Takata airbag recall status for some models

The net enveloping vehicles in the Takata airbag inflator recall just seems to keep widening. Honda is now updating its previous campaign to revise the status for even more models that were ever registered in (or originally sold in) 13 high-humidity US states and territories.
All of these vehicles were included in the company's earlier repairs. However, at the time this fix was titled "a safety improvement campaign." This latest action upgrades that condition to "a formal recall," according to Honda's official statement. The models include: the 2003-2005 Honda Accord, 2001-2005 Civic (pictured above), 2002-2005 CR-V, 2003-2004 Element, 2002-2004 Odyssey, 2003-2005 Pilot, 2006 Ridgeline, 2003-2005 Acura MDX and the 2005 Acura RL. All of these need to have their passenger-side, front airbag inflator replaced, and the recall affects Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Saipan, Guam and American Samoa.
As with the rest of these affected vehicles, it's possible in a collision for the inflator to rupture spraying metal shrapnel at occupants. There are at least 139 injuries attributed to this problem from a variety of automakers so far. Among this latest population of vehicles, Honda says there have been no confirmed injuries or fatalities related to these exploding inflators.