Budget 2019

[mcs627]

1 hour ago, iRage said:

I don't know if you are being sarcastic or being completely oblivious.

 

Neither. Yours truly enjoys playing the devil's advocate.

Edited April 22, 2019 by mcs627

[vag2]

2 hours ago, iRage said:

and the other's Hybrid tech has been improved via Toyota's Hybrid know-how

. Until recently Toyotas hybrid system was untouchable due to patent protection anyone willing to use it had to pay huge license fees. Then the European and other JOEM successfully developed series hybrids at lower cost(48V), merged with turbocharged gdi downsized engines to achieve similar mileages and more power. In the end Toyota realized that their hybrid technology was becoming a "Galapagos syndrome" (like their mobile phone technology faced distinction against iPhones,android phone) and last month decided to share it (open source) with third party car makers who were willing to use it. So far only one Chinese startup has shown interest, lets see how it competes with the mainstream hybrid technology.

[iRage]

4 hours ago, vag2 said:

untouchable due to patent protection anyone willing to use it had to pay huge license fees.

4 hours ago, vag2 said:

and last month decided to share it (open source) with third party car makers who were willing to use it.

Actually no....since about 5 years ago they have been sharing the HSD tech with other parties as part of the Toyota Environmental Challenge 2050....so it wasn't something that came about last month, the open source patent just became official last month. Until then they did give out a lot of resources starting from battery tech to HSD systems for free and some under technical partnerships. 

At the end of the day....one cannot deny the fact that Toyota is still the most selling Hybrid vehicle followed by Honda I believe ? Yes...combining diesels with Hybrids and turbo charged gasolines would give better mileage because of the inherent benefits of diesels and downsized gasolines...but then again none of the Japanese manufacturers were (and are) in to diesels for passenger vehicles (Japanese legislature killed it), and where getting more horse power is concerned...perhaps with the exception of Honda none of the other Japanese manufacturers are really in to that. Even when they do go for power it is for specialized vehicles where..well the buyer really would have very specific needs. 

The intent of opening the patent was mainly for other start-ups to develop the system and Toyota even would give technical assistance for further R&D with the intent of moving away from fossil fuels. In many ways Toyota does not seem to be interested in other "manunfacturers" adopting their Hybrid tech...after all most of the big manufacturers did partner up with them. BMW in 2011 partnered with Toyota to share Diesel tech and Hybrid Tech. Then there was Mazda where the partnership was about sharing HSD with Mazda and Mazda shares its know-how n developing an integrated platform (SkyActive). Toyota was giving the HSD tech to the Chinese for some time...mainly because Toyota wanted the Chinese''s EV tech know how (because Toyota seriously screwed up EV vehicle tech for themselves so they went about pretending Hybrids were better  )

But then all this is good and fine...but what is the logic behind putting a luxury tax on an econo brand like Toyota and having a luxury brand like Mercedes exempt from a luxury tax ? Just sets the wrong message/precedence on what they vehicles are.

 

[mcs627]

37 minutes ago, iRage said:

But then all this is good and fine...but what is the logic behind putting a luxury tax on an econo brand like Toyota and having a luxury brand like Mercedes exempt from a luxury tax ? Just sets the wrong message/precedence on what they vehicles are.

 

Rolls Royce and Bentley are luxury brands. Mercs and BMWs may be pricier than Pugs and VWs (and definitely Toyotas and Hondas) but one is not paying for luxury but rather the premium for R&D for safety and innovation. If one looks at 8 y old vehicles on the roads of Colombo the Bimmers and Mercs remain pristine whilst the majority of the KK + series Japs that were imported when duties were slashed in 2011 look wasted and are probably nobody's babies finding their way quietly to the suburbs and peripheries. BTW I've had the benefit of both worlds.

Edited April 22, 2019 by mcs627

[vag2]

4 hours ago, iRage said:

since about 5 years ago they have been sharing the HSD tech with other parties as part of the Toyota Environmental Challenge 2050....so it wasn't something that came about last month, the open source patent just became official last month. Until then they did give out a lot of resources starting from battery tech to HSD systems for free and some under technical partnerships. 

which other parties are meant here, any other non-related Companies using Toyota hybrid technology apart from Japanese universities and Reserach bodies?

Here is a good article which explains why Toyota opened up its hybrid patents.

https://electrek.co/2019/04/03/toyota-opens-patents-save-hybrid-cars/

1.generate income from fee-based services from a technology that is going Outdated(Galapagos 2 )

2.hope other Startups would use hybrid technology and keep it alive, and slow down a complete shift to EVs while Toyota is able to join the EV race

Auto Industry is changing, with shorter lifecycles Quality will suffer, because there will no more be Time available to perform DRBFMs even for a small change in Cup-holder design anymore like Toyota engineers do!

Edited April 22, 2019 by vag2

[iRage]

10 hours ago, mcs627 said:

Rolls Royce and Bentley are luxury brands. Mercs and BMWs may be pricier than Pugs and VWs (and definitely Toyotas and Hondas) but one is not paying for luxury but rather the premium for R&D for safety and innovation. If one looks at 8 y old vehicles on the roads of Colombo the Bimmers and Mercs remain pristine whilst the majority of the KK + series Japs that were imported when duties were slashed in 2011 look wasted and are probably nobody's babies finding their way quietly to the suburbs and peripheries. BTW I've had the benefit of both worlds.

and thus my original question...why would an econo brand like Toyota get a luxury tax whilst the premium brand like Mercedes be excempt from Luxury Tax ? Does not go along with the intent of the brand let it be Premium or Luxury (which brands like Mercedes do cross-over).

Also....you cannot just imply in to saying japanese cars do not age well because of poor build quality...it is also about maintenance. 95% of the people who buy Japanese cars buy them for the perceived cheap running costs and they are not maintained that well apart from carrying out the most basic of services (most at cheap garages) and most of these cars get fixed with substandard cheap chinese parts....

Edited April 23, 2019 by iRage

[iRage]

10 hours ago, vag2 said:

which other parties are meant here, any other non-related Companies using Toyota hybrid technology apart from Japanese universities and Reserach bodies?

Here is a good article which explains why Toyota opened up its hybrid patents.

https://electrek.co/2019/04/03/toyota-opens-patents-save-hybrid-cars/

1.generate income from fee-based services from a technology that is going Outdated(Galapagos 2 )

2.hope other Startups would use hybrid technology and keep it alive, and slow down a complete shift to EVs while Toyota is able to join the EV race

Auto Industry is changing, with shorter lifecycles Quality will suffer, because there will no more be Time available to perform DRBFMs even for a small change in Cup-holder design anymore like Toyota engineers do!

1. You do realize that the related companies became related because they wanted the Toyota HSD know how right ? Thus, after they become related it really does not make sense to say it does not count.

As for your article....the website is not the most well balanced or unbiased websites around. They have a strong following of skeptics and doomsday followers  and they have openly indicated that they have strong interest in Teslas economic success (so when they say don't fall in to Toyotas trap...can't one just as easily say that Tesla has interest in maintaining EV only vehicle's success rather Hybrids let it be gasoline or FCVs ?)

A few notes:

1. The tech is not stated to be able to be used in EV vehicles because Toyota has not used it successfully in EV vehicles. No one has. Thus, it would not be in their best interest to say it can be used in EVs.

2. What fee-based services ? The patent is free....and for further development the technical assistance is FREE.

3. Toyota has not gained traction in the EV market thus they have been cozying up with the Chinese for ages. The CH-R has an EV variant, the Chinese Corolla is supposed to be next, etc...the other EV vehicles around the world have been small-scale. Also, it is interesting to know that the website does not site the fact that one reason Toyota lost out on the EV race was because of what the American gas industry did in the late 90s (where Toyota first developed the EV RAV4...).

4. Japanese manufacturers believe that Hybrid and EV vehicles are transient technologies and that the next long term step would be fuel cell vehicles along with a shift to personal mobility devices and large volume transport solutions. So they have no interest in prolonging Hybrids indefinitely. In fact Toyota and Honda are investing heavily in Japan with the government in setting up Hydrogen stations....Any country's or company''s positioning on the technology scale is cyclic....so it is natural for a certain company or country to be at the low end of technology spectrum whilst another is ahead until the next step comes in.

4a. Toyota's explanation as to not do complete EV vehicles by themselves has always been a matter of production volumes. They have always claimed that they have the capacity to build only a few tens of thousands of EV vehicles but a few 100 of thousands of Hybrids (i suppose this is in terms of batteries); and that their assessment is that the number of Hybrid vehicles will provide more ecological benefits than a few thousand EV vehicles (i.e. they will be selling more gasoline vehicles as lesser eco friendly vehicles). Of course the legitimacy of this claim can be questioned (how eco benefit was calculated etc...)

5. Yes cars have shorter life spans. But that does not mean neither Euro nor Japanese nor Korean manufacturers have reduced their R&D processes and compromised quality. The Europeans did that in the past....the Japanese did that in the 2000s and it did not work for either one of them.  When R&D processes were short (or manufacturers were in a rush to put out technologies) all of them had issues of quality. They have changed that now for the most part not by compromising R&D but by developing long lasting, evolving platforms (Mazda started it with the SkyActiv) and partnering with other manufacturers. No one spends long R&D time on things that do not matter like cup holders or plastic components. They (all of them) spend time on long R&D on things that matter...like engines, etc...but for the record..you should also know that designing the structure of something that seems as trivial like a cup holder is not as simple as it seems. So it is not a valid statement to say R&D cycles have compromised quality.

At the end of the day..you need to except that all these companies are there to make money. None of them are charities (they do charitable work but not charities). Thus, their financial sustainability always comes in to play (and Tesla pretty much  play the game by projecting themselves as the disruptors and trying to be the Robin Hood amongst them). In the long term..the biggest issue all these companies face is that the younger generations are moving out of cars...

Edited April 23, 2019 by iRage

[vag2]

19 hours ago, iRage said:

What fee-based services ? The patent is free...

the basic technology for use in a hybrid is free, and additional risk assessments and tweaks for harder use in EVs for example will bring in money as consultation fees(at least,that's the concept)

I still am curious to know which other car manufacturer was allowed to use Toyota hybrid patents before 2019.

[iRage]

5 hours ago, vag2 said:

the basic technology for use in a hybrid is free, and additional risk assessments and tweaks for harder use in EVs for example will bring in money as consultation fees(at least,that's the concept)

I still am curious to know which other car manufacturer was allowed to use Toyota hybrid patents before 2019.

Actually no....further development of the technology and technical assistance for it is stated to be free ! Of course, Toyota benefits from it as well because they get to see how their tech can be further developed and used  

As I said before...BMW and Mazda partnered up with Toyota for Hybrid tech transfer (in return they had to share turbo engine tech to suspension to integrated platform know-how).....then part of Suzuki and Toyota's partnership involved transfer of Hybrid tech (granted initially it was mainly sharing of battery tech for small cars (which Toyota I suppose was looking at using for Daihatsu ?) and small cars themselves. The components of the Synergy Drive, etc... came in to play only recently. Then the PSA partnership also looked in to Hybrid exchange but nothing materialized from it....Then if you go through Toyota's annual reports you will see that since about 2013/2014 they have been giving away a lot of components to smaller manufactures (sorry i don't know who). I know when Porsche was looking in to the Hybrid Panamera and Cayenne they were in discussion with Toyota about the Hybrid system (not sure if anything came out of it). Actually, what Toyota did last month is kind of a kick in the face for these partners  

[vag2]

yes you are right. non of the partnerships were working ,because the partners were uneasy about how very little of hybrid technology Toyota actually was willing to share, while expecting to squeeze as much knowhow about common rail turbo diesel, small car design etc from them.? In the end they all decided to stay away from Toyota hybrid technology and developed alternatives which became mainstream,due to synergies and economies of scale.

[iRage]

13 hours ago, vag2 said:

yes you are right. non of the partnerships were working ,because the partners were uneasy about how very little of hybrid technology Toyota actually was willing to share, while expecting to squeeze as much knowhow about common rail turbo diesel, small car design etc from them.? In the end they all decided to stay away from Toyota hybrid technology and developed alternatives which became mainstream,due to synergies and economies of scale.

well..now you are just being blindly pessimistic and saying negative things for the sake of saying things....the partnerships were never about directly copying everything from each other....there were about tech knowledge transfer. So NO....it is rather blind to say that the partnerships never worked. When you transfer technology know how...the intent is to  learn from each other for our own thing rather than taking the other person's work.Toyota was working on the downsized Turbo engines and BMW was working on Hybrids well before the BMW-Toyota partnership....but what Toyota learnt from BMW did transfer in to improving their engines and what BMW learnt from Toyota would reflect in their Hybrid systems (this does not mean a direct copy). Same goes with Subaru. Mazda and Toyota worked on integrated platform strategies together...that does not mean that the TNGA-C platform is the mid size SkyActive platform with a different name. Also, you cannot say that BMW gave much more than Toyota did...in fact there is speculation that the new Supra has an exact copy of the BMW engine dropped in to it because the production process was not to be replicated and also there is the fact that BMW did not let Toyota change the engine to suit the slightly different layout of the Supra Toyota wanted. The only time the system looks exactly the same is in the case of the Axela were Mazda was never interested in developing a Hybrid system and they have claimed that over and over again....their only interest in Hybrids were just as a stop-gap until they could develop engines like the SA-X. Would be interesting to see what the next step is as the world moves away from gasoline. With PSA they never went with Hybrids because it was not feasible for them considering the market.

[Junkfriend]

Heyy guys,

According to new amendment a jeep with 1999CC Diesel engine will not have any luxury tax right?

 

?