Honda’s press conference begins – and that dastardly clever little swot ASIMO strolls onto stage. I swear his animation gets better every year – he’ll be running for prime minister next. He saunters onto stage and introduces Honda CEO Ito-san, but then let’s me down. I want ASIMO to pretend to fall asleep during Ito-san’s speech, or make a show of getting off the stage, but clearly his programmer’s value their jobs too much to be cheeky.
Ito-san spells out Honda’s breadth of business interests with their 23 million customers worldwide last year – that’s cars, bikes, lawn mowers, power generators, quad bikes, etc, etc -– and then confirms the CR-Z for production. We all knew it had got the green light, but this is the official say-so. It looks great inside and out, though the touch-pad interior will go, but unfortunately the tiny back seats will remain. Don’t buy the CR-Z if you have a family of 3, or more.
The Lambo scissor-doored Skydeck hybrid MPV looks cool, but we’re struck by the cute EV-N and an electric Cub bike and wheelchair too. The bizarre one-wheeled monocycle (aren’t they all?) called the U3-X raises a wry smile. Much hilarity ensues as the Honda hostesses teeter around the stand.
The VFR1200F is the world’s first motorbike with a twin-clutch transmission, and there’s the EVE-neo prototype for how an electric scooter could shape up (NB Honda wouldn’t be first to market with this product).
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