August has gone; we are already in September. Before closing summertime, I took time to close the DVN Japanese chapter and our DVN trip to Japan with a summary of our visit to Honda R&D HQ in the north of the Tokyo area. Honda R&D opened their doors wide to DVN and answered our questions on strategy, particularly about lighting. My main takeaways are that Honda have a very clear lit-logo strategy; same for ADB with high beam divided into two distinct areas; and they hold safety as the most important matter in their lighting development.
It was likewise a pleasure to talk and listen with Nissan R&D and learn more about their new Leaf’s rearlamp with its 3D holographic concept. And same with Toshiba, who shared with us about their exchangeable light source sockets they started to showcase in Shanghai last year, then Munich, and Tokyo, and they’ll have them in Livonia at the DVN Workshop next week.
We have also just published a report about the Japanese vehicle and vehicle lighting market. It provides a clear overview of Japanese automakers and lighting suppliers; get it here.
Meanwhile, the Chengdu auto show has just started with a lot of new Chinese cars. We look into it this week with really interesting cars and lighting content.
The DVN team are busy-busy-busy! Next week, Felipe, Daniel, Geoffrey, Christophe, and I will be in Michigan for the DVN Workshop. Wolfgang will be at IAA. Holidays are clearly behind us, time to restart — ‘The show must go ON!’, I say. While some people are thinking about automotive crises, other are continuing to launch new cars and the automotive world has never been so active. What an amazing time, isn’t it!
Take care,
