Mitsubishi: There is no falsification problem that cannot be solved by one, and if so, then one more

If the Japanese who meet and sleep are the most polite in the world, then the executives of the Mitsubishi Group are among these elites. Because in the past less than two years, they have been publicly and twice exposed to the public and the media - although the purpose is not related to politeness - apologized for their own fraud.

Defrauding customers of Mitsubishi materials data fraud

Mitsubishi executives last disclosed publicly last week.

On November 24, Takeuchi Zhang, president of Japan’s non-ferrous metal giant Mitsubishi Materials Corporation, acknowledged at the press conference that there were problems with the company's three subsidiaries, namely Mitsubishi Electric Wire Industry, Mitsubishi Shinko Copper and Mitsubishi Aluminum Corp., that had falsified technical parameters of manufactured products. Then 90° apologized to the public.

Japanese media report screenshot

It is understood that Mitsubishi’s counterfeiting issue was caused by Mitsubishi Materials falsifying its product test data and providing its customers with rubber gasket products that did not meet the material requirements specified in the contract. This counterfeit activity can be traced back to 20154. month. Another subsidiary, Mitsubishi Shindoh, tampered with metal product data. This counterfeiting can be traced back to October 2016.

Although Mitsubishi claims that it has not yet received a report on the safety issue, its material will not actually meet the customer's requirements. Unless the redundancy of the customer's design index is far greater than the shrinkage of the counterfeit, Mitsubishi's counterfeit materials will inevitably affect the customer. Quality of products.

In fact, as early as February of this year, Mitsubishi Electric had discovered the issue of counterfeiting internally and reported to the top management in March. However, the product in question was not shipped until October 23, half a year later. It was another month before Mitsubishi announced the incident. This kind of management problem has caused people to think about it, and there are public opinion that Mitsubishi's fraud problem is being made known or even directed by senior management.

The current data is that the number of companies purchasing Mitsubishi-related unqualified products has increased to 274, involving many industries such as aerospace, automobile manufacturing, mechanical equipment and electronic equipment, and even the Japanese Self-Defense Force (ships and aircraft engines). . In the automotive industry, major Japanese automakers such as Toyota Motors, Honda Motors, and Suzuki Motors are also investigating whether Mitsubishi Materials' unqualified products have been purchased or used.

Domestic car fuel consumption is too high? Maybe it's because of Mitsubishi's fraud

For quite some time in the past, many autonomous car brands have installed Mitsubishi-supplied engines on their own products. However, these self-owned brand products generally show high fuel consumption problems, such as the market segment sales of Haval H6. Previously, we had always thought that it was the high fuel consumption caused by the inability of self-owned brands, but now it seems that this cold pot may be dumped to Mitsubishi.

This was the case. Mitsubishi's partner Nissan wanted to kick off Mitsubishi and develop the model they once worked with. As a result, during the development process, some of the indicators failed to reach the target value given by Mitsubishi, so they bought it. Mitsubishi's car was benchmarked and found Mitsubishi's "little secret."

Originally, Mitsubishi’s fuel consumption was not “tested” by laboratories, but Mitsubishi’s R&D staff “calculated” based on experimental conditions: Mitsubishi uses the U.S. standard to implement measurements instead of Japanese standards in respect of tire and air resistance. The fuel economy test results are better than the actual situation, with the difference reaching about 5% to 10%. Due to the relatively relaxed supervision of the Japanese government on Japanese companies, Mitsubishi's own reports of false fuel consumption have not been discovered until Nissan hit this small report.

In contrast to the above-mentioned falsification of material indicators that lasted for more than two years, the history of fraudulent fuel consumption can be traced back to 1991, and it has been 25 years since it was revealed.

As a result, senior officials of Mitsubishi Motors had to stand in front of the guns of the media and admit their mistakes to the public at 90°.

Sales in China just saw how long Mitsubishi can sustain

In fact, Mitsubishi’s market performance in China has been relatively sluggish due to several scandals since 2000. Although its products are dominated by SUVs, even Jackie Chan’s elder brother has been a spokesman for several decades, and it hasn’t seen much improvement in the SUV market after 2010.

After a long period of downturn, there have been two sales growth surges in 2013 and 2017.

In particular, the fuel consumption fraud scandal in 2016 did not appear to have affected the market performance of the Mitsubishi brand in 2017. From January to July 2017, Mitsubishi’s sales volume in China reached 94,505 units, a year-on-year increase of 155%.

However, if it is said that fuel falsification can still be considered as affecting the use of products in a small area, the material fraud scan affects the evaluation of the Mitsubishi brand from a wider range of consumers and will cause consumers to have a negative perception of the Mitsubishi brand. Even a problem with the Mitsubishi Group is a small module. Mitsubishi, which uses a single brand strategy, will undoubtedly be affected by the overall reputation of its parent brand.

Then the question is, a company with a long tradition of fraudulent culture, and in the same case that its automotive products are also subject to counterfeiting, how many consumers are willing to accept its products is a curious issue.

There is a saying in Japan that reads, "There is no problem if you can't solve it. If there is, then you have to choose another one." Similarly, there is another saying that “consumers are forgetful.” Then, after the leaders of Mitsubishi continue to admit their mistakes, will Chinese consumers forgive or even forget Mitsubishi’s fraud?