Honda, Sony Finalize Joint-Venture Agreement – CNET [CNET]

The two will form the cleverly named Sony Honda Mobility Inc. for its future EVs.

Honda and Sony first announced in March that the two companies would team up to build electric cars, but the joint venture had yet to be established, and it was still being referred to as New Company. Now, they’ve put pen to paper and made things truly official.

Honda and Sony on Thursday announced the signing of a joint-venture agreement. This will create a new company, called Sony Honda Mobility, which the pair will use “to engage in the sale of high-value-added electric vehicles and provide services for mobility,” according to their joint news release. The JV will be headquartered in Tokyo, with Honda and Sony each owning 50% of it.

Honda will focus on manufacturing, mobility development, after-sales service, as well as environmental and safety tech, the announcement said. Sony will bring know-how in sensors, imaging, networking and entertainment. The JV will be established this year, with sales expected to kick off in 2025.

“We are very pleased to sign this joint venture agreement, which represents the start line from which we embark on the major challenge of revolutionizing mobility and creating new value,” Yasuhide Mizuno, senior managing officer at Honda and the future CEO of Sony Honda Mobility, said in a statement. “We plan to fully leverage the technological assets the two companies possess in different fields, such as Sony’s sensing technology and Honda’s original mobility development capabilities, to realize mobility and services that inspire and excite our customers.”

Sony first made its automotive intentions known at CES 2020, when it rolled out the Vision-S concept sedan, a slickly designed four-door loaded with Sony’s own sensors and infotainment tech. It was obvious the company meant business when it started road-testing the concept to validate what it built. However, the company reiterated that it didn’t really want to build a car, per se, leaving us wondering about Sony’s next steps. But now that it’s teamed up with Honda, it will be exciting to see how much of the Vision-S and its SUV sibling, the Vision-S 02, will actually make it to production in three years’ time.