Honda Reaches 100,000-unit Mark in Cumulative Global Hybrid Vehicle Sales

Tokyo, Japan, May 24, 2005; JCN Newswire - Honda Motor Co., Ltd. today announced that its cumulative worldwide sales of hybrid vehicles reached 100,000 units in April 2005, including approximate sales of 89,000 units in the U.S., 5,900 units in Japan, 3,800 units in Europe and 1,500 units in Canada.

Honda currently offers three hybrid vehicles: the Insight, Civic Hybrid and Accord Hybrid. In November 1999, Honda introduced in Japan its first hybrid car, Insight, which featured Honda's Integrated Motor Assist (IMA) technology and achieved the world's highest-level fuel efficiency* for a gasoline-powered mass-produced vehicle. (Insight became the first hybrid vehicle introduced in the U.S., in December 1999.) In December 2001, Honda launched the Civic Hybrid in Japan - introducing hybrid technology to one of Honda's global mass market models. (Civic Hybrid was introduced in the U.S. in March 2002.) In December 2004, Honda launched the Accord Hybrid in the U.S. as the world's first V6 hybrid vehicle, combining Honda's IMA hybrid technology with Variable Cylinder Management (VCM) engine technology.

*Fuel efficiency of Insight (10-15 mode, 5-speed MT) was 35km/liter at the time of introduction in 1999; the current model achieves 36km/liter.

Production of Honda's hybrid vehicles currently takes place in two production facilities in Japan - Suzuka (for Insight and Civic Hybrid) and Saitama (for Accord Hybrid). The Civic Hybrid is the most widely sold of these models, offered in 19 countries in North America, Europe, Japan and the Asia Oceania region.