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Honda Won’t Lower Insight Prices Despite Toyota’s Aggressive Campaign

The “fight” between the two Japanese giants Honda and Toyota in the green car sector is getting more interesting day by day. After Toyota this week announced it plans to cut prices of its upcoming Prius model to better match the pricing level of the Insight, Honda says it has absolutely no intention to reduce prices for this particular model. The reason?

"I don't think that would be meaningful to do so," Honda Motor Co. President Takeo Fukui told Autonews.

"I think that is something we can't do right now," he said. "We have to carefully examine the new Prius to know whether it is necessary for us to take certain measures."

On the other hand, Toyota continuously struggles to reduce pricing for its flagship hybrid in order to match the current level set by Honda. Recent rumors claimed that Toyota is even working on a cheaper version of the Prius that would incorporate slightly different features, such as less expensive materials and reduce equipment trims. Furthermore, it may seem like the largest Japanese automaker is also considering developing new hybrid versions of Auris and Yaris that would obviously come at lower prices compared to Prius.

According to dealerships in the United States, the entry-model Prius will be priced at 2.05 million yen ($20,750) which means it would cost almost as much as the mid-level Insight.

But Honda has more enthusiastic plans. Fukui explains the company wants to migrate the entire large-size vehicle lineup to hybrid powerplants, detrimental to diesel engines that would be more expensive and harder to upgrade to correspond with the American fuel consumption and emission ratings.

"We have to think about the balance between cost and effectiveness," Fukui said. “For larger vehicles, we think we might have to change the hybrid system so as to improve their efficiency. R&D is working hard on this. Even for larger-size vehicles, we think it's more realistic to think about hybrids. Therefore, we have changed our thinking.”
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About the author: Bogdan Popa
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Bogdan keeps an eye on how technology is taking over the car world. His long-term goals are buying an 18-wheeler because he needs more space for his kid’s toys, and convincing Google and Apple that Android Auto and CarPlay deserve at least as much attention as their phones.
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