Lexus Says No To Chinese Manufacturing On Quality Grounds

Despite huge import tariffs that put imported vehicles at a disadvantage in the Chinese market, Lexus has declared that it won’t be producing cars there anytime soon, owing to questions over the quality of Chinese manufacture .

Luxury competitors, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi have all established joint-venture production facilities with Chinese auto makers, to cater to what is seen as a pivotal market globally.

The majority of Lexus production currently occurs at one of six factories in Japan, with two North American facilities for North American delivered RX and ES (shown at top of article) models.

In a recent interview with Bloomberg, a Lexus senior executive indicated that production would remain in Japan to ensure that production quality would be maintained.

That’s despite a pricing chasm that sees imported Lexus vehicles priced some 30-percent higher than equivalent vehicles built within China.

Executive vice president of Lexus, Takashi Yamamoto, commented that there was “...too much quality risk in China to produce there.”

While Lexus is unsure of China’s production ability, industry analyst J.D. Power’s 2015 China Initial Quality Study shows that quality is improving.

Measuring quality on 'reported problems per 100 vehicles', J.D. Power’s results showed an industry average of 105 problems per 100 vehicles in China, compared with 112 problems per 100 vehicles in the US.

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