Why no Japanese large vans?

The announcement of a new HiAce van for 2019 started our brains ticking – not too fast, mind you, but ticking nonetheless. Why are there no large Japanese-brand vans?

Despite being leading global players and dominating the post-1980 light commercial market in Australia, Japanese van and truck makers have never made the move into the large van segment.

It’s the only market segment in which no Japanese maker has any representation, despite the increasing market for large vans in Australia. European large vans have this lucrative segment to themselves.

Obviously, the Australian market is far too small to base a model range upon, but the global market for large vans is huge and Japanese brands have a zero share.

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Even worse, electric van initiatives are almost entirely focussed in the large van segment, because the cost and weight of an EV powertrain and battery pack is much more easily amortised in a large van chassis, with its high cubic space and two-tonne payload, than it is in a small one-tonne van.

Examples are US-made and British-made electric vans being trialled in the USA and Europe by United Parcel Service (UPS). Most parcel companies around the world use large vans, not small ones.

I've visited small-item delivery companies in Japan and most of them use a fleet mixture of small vans and forward-control light trucks with aluminium bodies and rear roller door access, with and without tailgate lifts.

Delivery ergonomics in Japanese forward-control trucks are poor, compared with multi-door Euro and US large vans that have power-operated, automatic locking and unlocking side and rear doors, and low load heights.

When I asked why there are no Euro- or US-style large vans available in Japan, the owners of these delivery companies just shrugged their shoulders!

There have been promises by Japanese makers to produce large vans. One such concept vehicle made its way to Australia for the Brisbane Truck Show, back in 2005. This stylish Hino walk-through van also had a prototype hybrid powertrain, but it remained a concept only, despite assurances from Hino at the time that it would enter production.

At trucksales.com.au we were sure that the success of the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter in Australia would provoke a reaction from the Japanese, but not so.

In addition, European vans and van-based cab/chassis vehicles have taken over the Australian motorhome market, without any fight back from Japanese brands.

It's fair to say that Japanese auto makers have never succeeded in market segments that have no Japanese-domestic-market base. The obvious example is a high-performance linehaul prime mover that has no application in Japan, which is a geographically tiny, multi-island nation.

The maximum GVM/GCM in Japan is 24 tonnes, for all but indivisible and heavy haulage loads, so the country has no need for 600hp/3000Nm prime movers.

However, there is no such obvious exclusion for large vans that have similar footprints to forward-control light trucks, so we’re at a loss to explain this gap in Japan's otherwise globally competitive automotive lineup.

Over the years we've asked the question of Japanese company executives, but have never received a rational explanation…