Japan has very little high tech.
It tried to get into the semiconductor business by buying Britain’s ARM. That proved to be disastrous.
Its car industry is pedestrian. Germany still makes the best cars. Super rich want German cars not Japanese cars.
"its car industry is pedestrian, super rich want German cars not Japanese"
Funny you say that. It's usually the most economically deprived least educated ethnic enclave (we all know of which type) sh*tholes of East London, Luton, Oldham, Bradford, Alum Rock, Bolton, etc, have the highest BMW (borrow man wheels), Audi's, Mercs per capita. Whereas middle-class neighborhoods tend to be a bit more diverse. I live near Sandbanks. You see the occasional Lambo, Bently's, and Range Rovers. But you'd be surprised by the number of millionaire mansions with "normal" cars parked outside them. It's the same case in the US. Not all rich people behave like curry tycoons from the west midlands. Generally speaking, financially comfortable people tend not to flaunt their wealth that much, or invest in endless money pits, like most German luxury cars. At least not the clever ones. It's usually financially insecure with a fragile sense of masculinity that feels a primal need to flaunt their wealth in a vulgar manner. German cars are well optimised for that.
I'm told market research found that possessing an AMG, RS, or M badge makes you 76% more attractive to your female cousin in certain parts of town. The Germans certainly know their target audience well.
We should all aspire to pose around hired Lamborghinis and Bently's like the superrich Moulvibazaar/Mirpur boys!
Goofing aside, having worked in the German automotive industry (in Germany), I have certainly found cultural competencies and limitations.
I'd say Germans, when confronted with a problem, tend to dismiss all existing solutions as silly. They invent something completely new and novel. The end product ends up being perfect in precisely ONE dimension, at the cost of everything else. They also tend to over-engineer for no reason. I'm not completely knocking it, it has its place. Germany produced the likes of Dr. Ferdinand Piech, who I consider one of the finest brains in the auto industry.
I'd describe high-performance luxury German cars as thoroughbred racehorses. Under the most perfect conditions and pampering, it'll outrun everything else. But when things get a little less ideal, it suffers. And it spends most of its time at the stables being pampered. Japanese cars are more like war horses. It can perform 90% as well as the racehorse but under any condition. Rain, snow, mud, under fire, etc etc.
In other words, one is a toy for people who watch too much Top Gear. The other is a real car designed to work in the world world. It's Japanese cars that move more people and goods around the world than any other. If you want to attract your female cousin in Bethnal Green, you'd buy a Range Rover. If you're the UN and want the world's most dependable vehicle, you'd choose a Land Cruiser. A Range Rover looks better on paper. But I dare you to trust your life with it in the Australian Outback. Actually, you can't even count on a Range Rover keeping it together in mild English countryside, they are amongst the worst built/engineered cars in the road. The Japanese sell you actual mechanical quality. Germans and Brits sell you perceived quality. Expensive feeling interior, yet crappy cheap low-quality plastics in the engine bay (BMW).
Unlike Europeans, the Japanese view reliability and longevity as inherent parts of quality. A car should look after the owner, not the other way around. It's also why Japanese interiors often feel "cheaper" than their European counterpart. Yet they last far better over time. Engineered for longevity vs engineered for flexing. I rather have cheaper feeling plastics than cheap BMW intake manifolds!
This is why my 2006 GS450H (my first car) aged far better than a friend's 2012 535D with TWICE millage and far fewer repairs. When they both came out, the Beemer pimpmobile sold much better than the re-badged Toyota (at least in Europe). My Lexus hardly feels like an old car despite 145,000 miles. The beemer is literally falling apart lmao. And the Lexus is a more technologically advanced car with its complex hybrid powertrain, e-CVT gearbox, etc. More things to go wrong, in theory. Yet like every other Toyota product, it lasts. BMW can't even make a reliable hatchback! Japanese cars just age far, FAR better. Much like their women
If I had to buy a new luxury car, I'd rather go to Lexus than a German. Life is too short to waste money on maintaining fragile European cars. Besides, Lexus is far better built, with materials, build, and NVH levels that are only below the likes of Bently and Rolls Royce. It's the product of all the R&D and engineering know-how of the world's largest automaker.
It was the Japanese (Toyota and Lexus in particular) that forced everyone else to improve. They simply could not compete if they didn't up their game in technology/quality. They were absolutely killing it in the 80s and 90s. Japanese economic stagnation forced a lot of firms to play safe and sell pedestrian models. They were overtaken by the VW group but regained their position as the no1 automotive nation on earth. Toyota is in a revival period. They're winning in motorsports (5 wins at Le-mans, winning Dakar, winning WRC, winning lots of FIA GT racers, etc etc). It was a Toyota (TS050) that set the absolute lap record at Le-mans (Circuit de la Sarthe) circuit lmfao.
