HONDA MOTORS


            Honda Motor Company, Ltd. is a multinational corporation that originated in Japan. Honda Giken Kogyo is its Japanese name. It is well-known for its motorcycles and automobiles.


            Since 1959, the world’s largest manufacturer of motorcycles has always been Honda. Unknown to many, they are also annually manufacturing more than fourteen million internal combustion engines.  Quantified through volume,  it makes them the largest manufacturer of the world. In 2001, they exceeded another Japanese company, Nissan,  to be second largest producer of Japanese automobiles. They even outdid Chrysler, an American car, to become the fourth largest producer of automobiles in the Unites States.  Globally, they are rated as the sixth major manufacturer of automobiles.


 Honda was the primary car manufacturer that made available  and obtainable to the public in 1986 a luxury car, Acura. 


            Honda does not only manufacture motorcycles and automobiles. This is only the central part of their businesses. They also produce marine engines, power generators, garden apparatus, personal watercraft, and others.


            Honda has also been engaging itself to robotics research/artificial intelligence  since 1986. Their robot, ASMO, was launched in 2000.


            With the institution in 2004 of GE Honda Aero Engines, they  also undertook  an aerospace business. Delivery of their Honda HA-420 HondaJet is scheduled to be released sometime 2012.


            Honda allots a substantial portion  of their returns into  their research and development  technology.


            Soichiro Honda, the founder of Honda Motors, had had an enormous attraction to cars since his youth days. He set up the Honda Technical Research Institute located at Hamamatsu in Japan. The main objective of the institute was to develop and manufacture a motorbike engine with two cycles.  Asking the help of thousands of owners of bicycle shops throughout Japan to aid in invigorating a war-torn country, he was able to accumulate sufficient resources to wangle his first ever produced motorcycle, the Honda Cub.  This started the foundation and the rise of Honda Motors Company,  soon to be by 1964, the largest producer of motorcycles in the world.


            It is in Minato, Tokyo, Japan that Honda’s headquarter is located. Aside from the Tokyo Stock Exchange, their shares  are also included in the New York Stock Exchange, and  exchanges from Paris, London, and  Switzerland, among others.


            Honda’s assembly plants, aside from their plant in Japan,  are scattered around the world: in the United States,  Canada, Belgium, New Zealand, India, Turkey, Peru, China, Pakistan, England, Brazil, Indonesia, and Thailand    Almost ninety percent of Acura vehicles and other Honda products that were on the market in the United States in 2010 were manufactured in plants situated in North America.


            Honda has also partnered with other establishments as Dongfeng Honda and Guangzhou Honda in China, Honda Atlas in Pakistan, and Hero Honda Motorcycles and Honda Siel Cars in India.


            In 2008, while other manufacturers and business establishments as Toyota and the Detroit Big Three were reporting big significant losses, Honda’s sales increased to one percent. However, it experienced a nineteen percent downturn compared to its sales the year before. Sales of Accord and Civic were among the products  that  contributed to its sales increase.  Market analysts ascribed it to these aspects: vehicles that are extremely fuel efficient partly due to its size that ranges from  small to mid-size; and, the flexibility of Honda’s factories to manufacture or modify any product or model that consumers need at the current moment.


            All the same, Honda was still affected by the 2008 global financial crisis. They have lowered down their revenue forecasts. Nihon Keizai Shimbun in November 2009 noted that exports of Honda Motors have considerably decreased by a little less than sixty-five percent.


            After the mammoth effects of the March 2011 Japanese tsunami and earthquake, production in its plants at United Kingdom were cut in half.  This decision was arrived at because the plants experienced extreme difficulty in getting supplies particularly from Japan. Employees were put on a 2-day work week till May 2011.


             Honda’s Civic  carries with it the distinction of being the second-longest running model from Japan. As of the present, the Civic automobile has become bigger but more expensive.


            In 2008, Honda has boosted its world production of small cars due to the demand in the United States and other foreign markets. The manufacture of sport utility vehicles and minivans were  reduced  due to decreases in its demand and sales.



Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com


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