Red bean paste, Smee Maasai.
Yesterday, the famous bowing scene reappeared as executives from Japanese automakers such as Toyota, Mazda, and Honda held an editorial meeting and bowed 90 degrees to the audience to apologize.
The attitude is sincere, but the familiar posture has long lost its novelty. For Japanese companies, mistakes are different but bowing remains the same. The standard action for many Japanese car company executives in response to mistakes is to bow first.
The reason for this bow is also the same old problem – fraud and cheating.
The problem is that the fraud has a wide impact and involves too many car companies. Five manufacturers, including Toyota, Mazda, Yamaha, Honda, and Suzuki, have committed fraud when applying for model designation.
Even Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary criticized it at an editorial meeting, saying, “This damages the credibility of our country's automobile industry.”
Japanese media have also begun to worry, saying that Japan's auto fraud may drag down Japan's economic recovery and affect the country's GDP.
The leaders of the three major automakers bowed collectively
“As the head of the group, I sincerely apologize to everyone. I think this is a problem that shakes the foundation of the certification system, and it is something that an automobile manufacturer must never do.”
On the afternoon of June 3, Akio Toyoda held an “apology meeting” in Tokyo regarding Toyota Motor's “testing violations and submission of false data.”
Executives from two automakers, Honda and Mazda, also bowed.
According to a message released by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism of Japan on June 3, because Toyota Motor's subsidiary “Daihatsu Industries” was repeatedly exposed for “inappropriate behavior in the process of obtaining type certification required for mass production of automobiles and engines”, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism of Japan requested a thorough investigation of whether there are similar situations in a total of 85 automobile manufacturing companies in Japan.
As of the end of May, five companies were caught.
Five companies, namely Toyota, Mazda, Yamaha, Honda and Suzuki, were found to have engaged in improper practices in vehicle performance testing and have been ordered to suspend shipments of some of their cars and motorcycles under production.
On the same day, senior executives from Toyota, Honda and Mazda held editorial meetings to apologize for the incident. Even Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi said at an editorial meeting on the 3rd that “this has damaged the credibility of our country's automobile industry.”
Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism has instructed Toyota Motor, Mazda and Yamaha Motor to suspend production of some of the cars and motorcycles currently in production, and will take future actions based on the results of on-site inspections and relevant regulations.
It is worth mentioning that Japan’s unprecedented fraud scandal may not just involve these five companies. The 85 automobile companies have not been thoroughly investigated. Only 68 companies have been investigated so far, and investigations into 17 companies, including Toyota, are still ongoing.
Specifically, Toyota currently has three existing models that submitted incorrect data in pedestrian safety tests, including the Corolla Fielder, Corolla Axio and Yaris Cross, and used modified test vehicles in collision safety tests of four older models.
In addition to Toyota, Mazda Motor Corporation has two major fraud cases involving five models.
First, in the 50km/h frontal collision test, the airbags were made to pop out through a countdown rather than after sensing the collision. This involved three models: the Angkesaila, Atez and MAZDA 6.
Another issue involves MX5 and MAZDA 2. In order to pass the engine test, Mazda tested the vehicle in a closed environment for 1 hour, and used the abnormal increase in intake temperature that would only occur under unnatural driving conditions to circumvent the program of automatically adjusting the ignition timing. In the end, the test results were artificially manipulated.
Mazda also announced that it would immediately suspend sales of the MX5 RF and Mazda 2 models for internal review and rectification.
The direct consequence of the two automakers' successive production suspensions may affect their sales performance in May and June.
According to Japanese media reports, analysts at Chunishi Automotive Industry Research believe that Toyota and Mazda are likely to reduce production by 20,000 to 30,000 vehicles within two months. “Due to this problem, the pace of normalization in May and June may slow down.”
As for Honda, although the number of vehicles involved is the largest, with 22 models, the severity is the lowest, involving only false statements in noise test reports. Similarly, Yamaha also made false statements in noise test reports of two vehicles it produced in the past, and Suzuki made false statements in the brake test results of a previous model.
However, Honda also issued a statement, admitting that the vehicles sold had improper certification testing, but it conducted internal technical verification and actual vehicle testing, and confirmed that the vehicles met the prescribed legal standards. The performance of the finished vehicles will not be affected and they can be driven normally in the future.
How many vehicles are suspected of data and test falsification?
On June 3, Honda Motor Company issued an announcement that the company had engaged in improper behavior in engine testing and other aspects since 2009, involving a total of approximately 4.35 million vehicles; on the same day, Toyota Motor Corporation issued an announcement stating that the total number of vehicles involved in the company's testing violations had reached 1.7 million.
Mazda also announced the results of an investigation, saying that there were violations in crash tests and engine power tests on a total of approximately 150,000 vehicles produced after 2014.
These Japanese car companies issued announcements and held editorial meetings to apologize. The Japanese joint ventures in China were also panicked. Fortunately, the models involved in the fraud did not flow into the country.
On the same day, Toyota China quickly issued a statement to apologize to Chinese consumers. It also stated that the models sold by FAW Toyota, GAC Toyota and Lexus in the Chinese market have nothing to do with this incident, and the models they produce do not have any safety or quality issues.
From a practical point of view, although this counterfeiting scandal will not affect domestic products, its credibility has been greatly reduced. This is why the craftsmanship spirit advocated by the Japanese is jokingly called “stubborn spirit” by domestic netizens.
The myth of quality has fallen from grace
The origin of this unprecedented vehicle data falsification incident can be traced back to April last year.
At that time, Daihatsu Motor admitted that four models developed for overseas markets (Toyota Yaris Ativ, Perodua Axia, Toyota Agya and an undisclosed product) had falsified collision tests.
Less than a month after the incident, Akio Toyoda, then chairman of Toyota, bowed and apologized, announcing that he would conduct a detailed investigation into the incident.
After an in-depth investigation, it was found that not only Daihatsu itself, but also its parent company Toyota had 22 models involved, and some models of Subaru and Mazda, which have automotive cooperation relationships with Daihatsu, were also implicated.
A third-party committee investigating Daihatsu Motor's quality violations released a report on December 20, 2023, stating that the quality violations had expanded to almost all models, including Toyota Motor and other company brands, with 64 models involved in violations.
As the scope of the incident became larger and larger, Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism could no longer sit still and demanded a thorough investigation of 85 automobile manufacturers in Japan.
This incident is the result of a thorough investigation by all parties, which can be said to be a case of pulling out radishes and bringing out the mud.
In fact, before this thorough investigation, Japanese automakers had already become “habitual offenders” in falsifying data.
In January 2024, it was revealed that four engines produced by Toyota Industries Corporation had falsified exhaust emission test data.
In August 2022, it was revealed that the large and medium-sized truck engines produced by Hino Motors, a subsidiary of Toyota Motor, had violated regulations such as data falsification in fuel consumption and exhaust emissions tests. The product certification of the relevant models was revoked, and as many as 567,000 vehicles were affected.
In February 2021, Japan's Akebono Brake Industry Co., Ltd. admitted that it had falsified 114,327 items of quality inspection data over a period of 20 years. It is worth mentioning that it is also an auto parts giant controlled by Toyota Motor.
In the same year, Mitsubishi Electric was exposed for falsifying product inspection data, which may have lasted for more than 30 years. In addition, Toyota Mobility Tokyo, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Toyota, falsified the inspection data of 565 vehicles in order to complete the inspection of Lexus vehicles within the specified time, mainly involving inspection items such as “headlight brightness”, “front tire angle”, and “parking brake performance”.
Among the endless stream of fraud incidents, it is not difficult to find that Toyota Motor Group has become the hardest hit.
On the one hand, Toyota has a very high penetration rate in the Japanese automobile industry. On the other hand, Toyota is also the company that best represents Japanese industry.
As we all know, Japanese car companies once prided themselves on their “craftsmanship” and made “Made in Japan” into a myth. There are many similar slogans, such as “As long as it is made in Japan, it represents quality assurance” and “There must be a road in front of the mountain, and there must be a Toyota car on the road.”
Statistics from the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association show that the automobile industry accounts for about 20% of Japan's total manufacturing shipments. R&D expenses, including parts, account for nearly 30%, both ranking first in the manufacturing industry. Including related industries, the number of employees exceeds 5.5 million.
Therefore, when Japanese automakers commit fraud, the entire company is affected. According to a survey by Japan Furuitai Co., Ltd., 25% of Japanese companies have violated regulations in the past five years, of which 32.7% involved product quality issues. Obviously, fraud is no longer an occasional behavior of a few companies.
Japanese manufacturing used to be a guarantee of quality, but now scandals are exposed one after another. Is the myth of Japanese cars really coming to an end?