Mazda’s Chief Operating Officer, Masahiro Moro, has expressed some frustrations that the company’s battery-electric lineup is struggling to gain traction, stating that any EV, other than a Tesla, simply isn’t popular with buyers.
In a surprisingly candid interview with Fortune, Moro said that “EV is an absolutely important technology, and we are developing it.”
“But in the U.S., EVs last year were about 6 per cent of the market… this year it is 8 per cent, and of that 8 per cent, 57 per cent was Tesla… other EVs are not taking off,” he said.
Remarkably, he added that Mazda’s “inventory is piling up,” making it clear that the company is having trouble winning-over buyers in the United States.
In terms of a timeline for Mazda moving to an entirely battery-electric lineup, the CEO said that “how we get to zero is up to consumer choice and social infrastructure.”
Mazda’s first attempt at a battery-electric vehicle, the MX-30 was met with skepticism in the United States, with a reported sales tally of just 100 units in the first eight months of 2023; a drop of 69 per cent over 2022’s figures, according to reports.
Surprisingly, the MX-30 was sold only in the state of California, leaving 49 states out in the cold.
Here in Australia, things aren’t much better for Mazda’s sole battery electric vehicle, amassing just a dozen vehicles sold so far this year, with the company axing the MX-30 from the lineup at the end of 2023 with just north of 2,200 units sold so far.
Keyword: Mazda CEO Says Electric Vehicles (Other Than Teslas) are “Not Taking Off”