A company run by engineers
From Engineers Rule
Honda has never had an unprofitable year. It has never had to lay off employees. In the fiscal year that ended in March, profit grew 12%, to $5.1 billion, on $84 billion in sales. In the U.S., which accounts for 43% of Honda's sales, vehicle sales are up 7% through July, even as the industry slipped 5%. The company sold more vehicles in July than one member of the old Big Three, the Chrysler Group.
...
Honda is using psychology to try to help mitigate a big safety problem for bikers: Drivers don't see them coming. It turns out that if the bike looks like an angry face, motorists take notice.
Labels: engineers, honda, Motorcycle
posted by Yen at
9:46 AM
1 Comments:
"If a Toyota Prius just looks too friendly for your tastes, you’re not alone. People readily see faces and traits in cars, and a new study suggests that they prefer cars to appear dominant, masculine and angry." http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/081006-car-face.html
The problem I have with this kind of study is that it relies on the researchers opinions on whether a car looks happy or angry in order to establish the metric; hardly scientific method.
As for Honda, business is a lot easier when you don't have to worry about the unions.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119196377029953821.html?mod=hps_us_pageone
I think unions have given us a lot in terms of workers rights, but I also think they are now doing more harm than good. I recognize their right to congregate, but at some point in the life of most long term committees, they fall far enough into corruption, or in the case of things like the UAW, work so hard on behalf of their constituency that they leave their employer too narrow a margin to weather the bad times. I'm not excusing the blind idiocy that has been the American auto industry of the last decade, but at this point downsizing would bankrupt them due to huge severance packages, while not downsizing will bankrupt them due to excessive salaries. Their hands are tied by excess regulation, and more government involvement can hardly save them. I think we will see them bought out by a foreign competitor. I still see the alternative as a slippery slope to a new kind of cold war. http://www.theallegator.com/free-market/do-superpowers-inevitably-degrade-into-socialism/
By
Anonymous, at 11:04 PM
Post a Comment
<< Home