Honda to Launch 'Affordable' Hybrid

TORRANCE, CA - December 15, 2007: Honda Motor Co. plans to launch a small car by 2009 that uses a new, affordable gas-electric hybrid engine as well as diesel-powered versions of its larger vehicles as part of a strategy to improve fuel-efficiency of its U.S. models, a senior company executive said Thursday.

Tetsuo Iwamura, head of Honda's U.S. sales and marketing unit, told the Wall Street Journal the company could tweak its plans depending on what kind of alternative fuel technologies U.S. consumers embrace. "At this moment, we say hybrid for small cars and diesel for large cars... but we have several other alternatives we are looking into," Iwamura said. One of the first cars under that strategy to hit the U.S. market is a highly affordable subcompact hybrid, slated for a launch in 2009. Iwamura said Honda is planning to sell 100,000 of the new small hybrids in North America and another 100,000 across the rest of the world. With the new subcompact hybrid Honda is aiming to cut the hybrid premium to less than $2,000. It is a "hybrid for everybody," he said.