Japanese electronics icon and automotive giant – Sony and Honda have created a joint venture called Sony Honda Mobility which will sell electric vehicles that will be delivered first in 206 for the US and Japanese markets. Pre-orders for the vehicle will start in late 2025 said Yasuhide Mizuno, the CEO of the newly formed electric car venture who is also a senior Honda executive.
Sony for the last three years has been its Vision S concept electric car at the CES show in Las Vegas which incorporated camera, network, sensor, and infotainment technology in an electric car manufactured by Magna. In March, it joined hands with Honda in a 50/50 partnership.
The new car will have Sony’s expertise from the consumer electronics and entertainment world meshed with Honda’s decades of experience with making cars at scale. Production of the new vehicle will also happen at Honda’s plant in the US.
The two are tightlipped about the specifics around powertrain and battery technology. "It was necessary to take a totally new approach. We want to make this completely new,” said Mizuno.
Its COO Izumi Kawanishi, who is also the boss of Sony Mobility, was the man behind the Vision S concept of vehicles. He said more partners will be added to the project. Honda already has a partnership with GM for its Ultium platform for motors and batteries, and they could be on the cards for this vehicle as it will be manufactured in the US.
Sony has missed the last few stages of the mobile computing wave. Its Xperia smartphone business hasn't gone anywhere since it was forced to sell its Vaio PC business. For it, electric cars could be the next big technological outlier.
Similarly, Honda has been lethargic to embrace electric cars and its recent moves have been aggressive and with a tech partner in Sony it will get access to computing technologies it is not capable of developing in-house.
