Japanese car sales "the sky is shattered", and the leader Toyota stops producing three models in one go!

In the first half of this year, the sales of Japanese cars in China fell across the board, of which Changan Mazda's sales fell by 49.4% year-on-year, Honda China and Nissan China's sales fell by more than 20%, and Toyota China, which has always been stable, also showed a year-on-year decline of 2.8%.

In January ~ July this year, the cumulative retail sales of Japanese cars reached 1,954,300 units, accounting for 17.3% of the Chinese market, down 17.1% year-on-year, second only to French cars.

The decline in sales of Japanese cars has already begun. According to data from the Passenger Association, in 2022, retail sales of all Japanese cars will be 4.092 million units, lower than that of German cars, down 10.3% year-on-year. Under such circumstances, Japanese car brands have to think of different tricks.

Nissan and Honda chose to reduce prices to survive, but Nissan's terminal discounts are already very large, there is not much room for decline, even so, can not reverse the decline in sales, Toyota in addition to improving terminal discounts, is also reducing models, streamlining product series.

According to media reports, GAC Toyota's YARiS L Zhixiang, YARiS L Zhixuan, and GAC Toyota iA5 models will be discontinued after the last batch of existing cars sold by dealers around the world.

These three cars, the first two models are actually in the era of fuel vehicles, or relatively popular models, are once hot models in the field of small cars, but with the rise of pure electric cars, the sales of these two cars have plummeted,

GAC Toyota YARiS L Zhixuan was launched in 2013 with a price of CNY 69,800 to CNY 108,800. In 2017, GAC Toyota YARiS L was officially launched as a YARiS L hatchback version with a price of CNY 6.98-109,800. These two cars are positioned as small cars. The cumulative sales of YARiS L from January to August 2023 were only 26,243 units, and even worse, YARiS L Zhixiang, with cumulative sales of only 26 units in the first eight months of 2023.

The small car market has almost been monopolized by pure electric models, the penetration rate of A0-level new energy exceeds 47%, BYD Dolphin sold 35,000 vehicles last month, Wuling Binguo also sold 19,000 units, fuel small cars almost have no place to stand.

GAC Toyota iA5 is a shell replacement car of the old AION S, and the 2022 model on sale is 15.98-192,800 yuan, whether it is price, endurance and configuration, it is not competitive in today's new energy vehicle market. In contrast, the price of the Aion S based on GAC's second-generation GEP pure electric platform is 13.98-191,600, which is 20,000 yuan cheaper than GAC Toyota iA5, so Toyota's logo, in the new energy era, is there a premium of 20,000 yuan?

The discontinuation of these three cars is not unexpected, it can be seen as GAC Toyota, the embodiment of cost reduction, in the face of the rise of domestic new energy, we may see more and more joint venture car companies have to start to stop their own "low price, low sales, lack of competitiveness" fuel and new energy models.