Same Old Nonsense.  Some things never change: "It is so sad, Toyota who was at the leading edge of EV technology in 2001 with the brilliant Prius, decided to go a different route to others and ended up being left behind."  It is usually pointless to response to such chest-pounding.  But it this case, it was in reply to an attack launched on the very few RZ450e owner post I encountered.  Only 12 days into the experience, he was already elated.  Despite being in Thailand, where DC fast-chargers are uncommon (like what I see pretty much anywhere in Minnesota still), it was no big deal.  The words "roomy" and "comfy" was how he described the vehicle.  It was nice to see that.  I reply to the nonsense comment attempting to sour the happy ownership post with:  That narrative requires an emphasis on range & speed, priorities that mainstream consumers don't share with enthusiasts.  Toyota has avoided that want-vs-need trap for over 20 years now.  This chapter in that long history is no different.  We will continue to hear claims of lost leadership, falling on deaf ears.  Know your audience... and be aware that we see how legacy automakers really don't have a transition plan, that their failure to supplement with plug-in hybrids while pushing attention onto battery-size will come back to haunt them.  Think about what is really required to appeal to the masses.

Put another way, that assessment of status is rubbish.

Know Your Enemy.  Tesla Model 2 plans for India are emerging.  That's interesting.  It puts fanboys in a difficult position.  They have been working to downplay the subtle shift of priorities related to batteries & production.  I noticed the quiet mention of change.  Most completely overlooked it then and now spin that move as what was endorsed as the long-term plan all along.  Ugh.  That's how enthusiasts work.  They fight a perceived opposing force, sometime making themselves their own worse enemy.  The more constructive individuals simply fail to see the bigger picture.  They battle with what is immediately in front of them, not considering a strategy to win the war.  That's how the Volt nonsense got so out of hand.  Their taunts of "vastly superior" were so childish and such a waste of resources.  The situation isn't much better still with Tesla.  Just look at how drastically different CyberTruck for here in United States is compared to an anticipated entry-level Tesla offering for the market in India.  Think about it and consider this:  It was interesting watching hype grow for 4680's commitment to a retaining nickel & cobalt as the patents for LFP were nearing expiration.  When Tesla quietly adopted LFP, it was an undeniable contradiction.  It put enthusiasts in a hypocritical position.  So, they attacked Toyota as a distraction... carefully trying to avoid addressing the obvious premature lock-in trap.  Not only was chemistry & packaging different, it also broke the supposed benefit of vertical-integration.  So as this topic gets more attention, we can remind readers how Tesla has been completely absent from the entry-level, low-profit market.  In other words, as we watch Tesla try to escape from the niche it is stuck it, expect new spin about how automaker is still years ahead of the competition.  The nonsense gets tiring.  We're all in this together.  The real enemy is ICE vehicles, not PHEV or BEV.  Anything with a plug is helping to break the grip of oil dependency.  Both carbon & smog emissions will be greatly reduced as a result.

Seeing Toyota advance from e-TNGA to that new platform in just a few years, while continuing to rollout to offerings, is leadership.  That is how "world beating" will be identified when BEV sales finally grow beyond this introductory stage we are currently in.

Arguing Against Diversity.  It was inevitable that someone favoring GM would ultimate come to their defense.  Remember the nonsense about how Two-Mode would best serve the market by focusing on the largest vehicles first?  Enthusiasts did a complete 180-turn on that one when Volt was rolled out.  They pretended there was never a Two-Mode prototype with a plug.  They argued smaller was better.  The danced themselves into a corner after floundering in circles for years.  That's happening again.  Bolt has been killed in favor of large BEV choices, something this enthusiast hasn't come to terms with yet: "PHEVs make no sense for small vehicles.  Why try to cram 2 full drivetrains into a small car instead of just adding some more batteries and thus getting rid of the noisy polluting ICE?  GM made the right decision to kill the Bolt and move to the Bolt."  We'll see Silverado EV & Blazer EV dominate GM's offerings for awhile, in addition to the monstrous Hummer EV.  To finally see a return of messaging for practical sizing will take years.  Of course, Equinox EV was already advertised as being available this Spring.  Enthusiasts turned a blind-eye to that missed self-imposed deadline... yet another over promise, under deliver.  Anywho, it comes down to absence of support for diversity, which sometimes comes about from not even understanding the technology.  Arguments without substance are a dead giveaway.  Notice how "range" claims almost always evade any type of detail?  Pointing out such blatant omissions is difficult.  I usually start simple by asking a question:  That's not how a well designed PHEV works.  There are not 2 full drivetrains.  True, there is the dead-weight argument for a gas-engine that is rarely needed.  Ironically, that same dead-weight argument puts BEV advocates in a hypocritical position.  Why carry around EV capacity for range that is rarely needed?

Pushback.  Some people never learn.  Some people are not aware.  Some people simply don't care.  I like to share insight for all of them.  That is especially important as we near another tipping-point.  There is good reason for Toyota & Stellantis to keep pushing the advantages they can bring to the market.  Too bad if other automakers haven't been able to make PHEV competitive.  We watched GM struggle for a decade, finally giving up.  They claimed BEV was the better choice.  They refused to accept a reality where a variety of solutions can be used to solve a problem.  Why must we solve climate-change, oil-dependency and air-quality problems with just a single technology for all?  What's wrong with spreading risk across a variety of technologies?  Needless to say, the online community like to push narrative... their own single-minded view how to fix a multitude of predicaments.  I posted:

CARB made the same mistake 2 decades ago with their own technology push, rather than allowing the industry to come up with their own means of meeting emission & consumption criteria.  Not learning a lesson from the past is one thing.  Shooting the messenger is another.

PHEV are reaching a tipping-point too, where cost & range make them an easy choice and a no-brainer leaving home every morning with a full battery.  BEV purists fear that competition, especially knowing PHEV make an excellent choice as a second vehicle when the other is a BEV.

That's our household.  I have a BEV.  She has a PHEV.  Because infrastructure simply isn't there yet, our trip to the lake weekend was with the PHEV.  We drove by 2 locations where DCFC are being installed.  That's very encouraging, for future travel. But for daily travel, we both drive using only electricity... which makes the uproar about PHEV a huge mistake from BEV purists.  Why fight those on your own team, helping to promote overnight charging?

Of course, some even more constructive BEV supporters end up being their own worst enemy at times.  The push for massive battery-packs to make inefficient BEV deliver more range is counter-productive... which is why Toyota & Stellantis are pushing back.  Notice how the industry promoting electricity guzzlers and favoring long-range configurations?

Capitalism.  It is bizarre how innovation from a perspective of making the best out of the least is not acknowledge is dismissed as just defending a doomed automaker.  We still have the brain-dead belief that cramming more battery into a vehicle is better.  The giant pickups coming are embraced as the epitome of design.  CyberTruck with a 350-mile range will be proclaimed king, far superior to the 500-mile range from Silverado EV.  Both will have massive packs.  Both will impair speed at DC fast-chargers due to their enormous draw.  Both will consumer long stays at those stations too.  It will be a challenge to avoid sounding hypocritical.  Arguments of speed & time get exposed as not being as important as they had once been claimed.  That's what market growth is all about though.  Initial offerings favor extremes, portraying them as the must-have reason for purchase.  But when the product is finally brought to the masses, some of those traits are toned down.  Admitting that much wasn't a necessity is difficult.  That's why so many Volt enthusiasts jumped ship.  As they saw that diminishing return and contradictory claim approach, it became a "fight or flight" situation.  Many choose flight.  It was quite vindicating.  We're heading in that direction again.  The path to mainstream acceptance is where many of those early-adopter-turn-enthusiast types don't want to go.  They enjoy their niche.  They have no regrets.  They do feel abandoned though.  I put it this way:  Capitalism thrives on making the best use of limited resources... which is exactly what PHEV does.  My 2017 Prius Prime delivered over 30 miles of EV from a tiny battery by squeezing out an impressive efficiency.  In the summer, I routinely saw 5.0 mi/kWh from just 6 kWh of electricity.  Toyota nailed it with their design, a profitable platform easily augmented to carry more capacity and a plug.  Just because other automakers weren't able to deliver the same is no reason to banish the technology.

Trouble For Toyota.  Really?  That sales discussion ended up stirring up this: "ICE down xEVs up.  Check.  Trouble for Toyota is 2/3rds of its worldwide sales are ICE."  I was intrigued to see if constructive feedback was possible, so I posted:

Why is that trouble?  VW sales of BEV last year was 7%.  Toyota keeps pushing hybrids because there's a large part of their market that simply won't be able to support BEV for a very long time still.

My trip to Tanzania 2 years ago overwhelmingly confirmed how far infrastructure must progress before even PHEV become practical in a country like that, where Toyota vehicles are extremely popular.  Knowing that Toyota has been pushing their ICE phaseout hard is very encouraging.

Their markets where BEV will be realistic... like the United States... will get the upcoming optimized platform in a few years.  No part of that is trouble. In fact, it's helping reduce carbon & smog-related emissions right now even without a plug.

Speaking of Toyota's closest legacy competitor, it's not like VW's plan are full steam ahead with BEV either.  That production halt at one of the ID.4 locations due to soft demand is good reason for VW to push forward with their Tiguan PHEV.

The rose-colored glasses BEV purists wear here are starting to show signs of reality.  Seeing market challenges taking longer to overcome than hype had promised is a bitter pill to swallow.  We'll get there, but the transition approach Toyota is taking doesn't appear as doom & gloom as they had portrayed.

Toyota Plug-In Sales.  These are the counts from the first half of 2023 in the United States.  2,893 (0.5% share) for BEV and 8,565 (1.5% share) for PHEV.  Both are curious measures, since bZ4X was still in the process of fulfilling initial orders placed when the recall wait messed things up and the new Prius Prime simply wasn't available yet with stock for the prior generation cleared out.  Let's not forget RAV4 Prime either, which got slammed by the sudden loss of tax-credit benefit.  It all sets up the second half of the year to be rather interesting.  Hearing about the next Prime for this market would be nice.  The strongest candidate for that would be Corolla Cross.  That decision would make a lot of sense.  It wouldn't compete directly with RAV4 Prime based on size & power, it is a more realistic size for worldwide sales, and the hybrid model is already produced in the United States... which could make the PHEV model immediately eligible for half the tax-credit (providing a $3,750 incentive).  There's the issue of NACS obscuring demand expectations anyway.  Combined with uncertainty from GM with Ultium rollout, time to work out strategy is available.  Timing could work out well for Toyota.  We'll see.

Hail Mary.  He agreed with my post by providing recognition of Tesla having taken a big gamble by acknowledging it does indeed looks like there will be a pay out.  He couldn't stand the approach I pointed out though: "NACS wasn't a hail mary for Tesla."  What is the point of arguing with that?  We all know that V4 of the Superchargers is coming.  That upgrade will bring about compliance upgrades... the ability to accept credit-card payments and a screen... along with the obvious necessity to lengthen the cord.  The big catch was having to deliver CCS-1 connections in this market.  Pushing to get NACS adopted widely could alter requirements of government support.  It's an interesting situation, one that is difficult to deny Toyota didn't see coming.  With so many attacks on Toyota for supposedly fighting against IRA, it's starting to become noticeable the claimed anti-EV stance really was in preparation for the next round of negotiations.  I have been saying that for years.  Toyota isn't opposed to support, it is opposed to approach.  They want better legislation written.  With the absence of a single DC fast-charging connection standard here, it is absurd to not see that as a major barrier to progress.  Of course, acknowledging that means agreeing with Toyota on something.  How could the enemy of plug-in vehicle vehicles be championing a worthy cause?  Gasp!  Needless to say, enthusiasts require a narrative to feed and will fit to the bitter end to support the perspective they worked so hard to spin.  You know they will claim NACS was inevitable, pretending outside pressure had nothing to do with Tesla's secret agreements with GM and Ford, that massive subsidy opportunity wasn't at risk.  There was no gamble.  Ugh.  Anywho, I wasn't about to put up with that nonsense:  Gambling the biggest draw to Tesla when pressure was building from the price-war front in both China & Europe and the CCS front from NEVI funding were both getting intense was what?