F&I Management & Training

Honda Motor today announced plans for a dramatic increase in the production of petrol-electric hybrid vehicles and said it would launch a hybrid-only model early next year. Japan's second-largest automaker said it expected to sell 500,000 hybrid cars annually beginning early in the next decade. Last year it sold slightly fewer than 52,000 units of its single hybrid model, a version of its Civic sedan that it has been selling since 2001. Honda is trying to catch up with rival Toyota, Japan's biggest carmaker, which has secured the global lead in low-emissions vehicles with its pioneering Prius hybrid, launched more than a decade ago. Toyota celebrated its millionth Prius sale in the first quarter of this year and has said it hopes to sell 1m hybrid cars annually sometime after 2010.

DATED: 21.05.08

FEED: AW