You can't lose at something you're not trying to do yet. Might as well admonish Apple for losing the smart assistant marketshare to the Palm Treo in 2006.
They did try, with the BZ4X and RZe, and that failed. They are now talking about spending massive amounts of money in BEV R&D, and scaling up etc etc. They issue is not that they aren't trying, the issue is that they are trying late, what they have tried so far failed, so they have suffered real losses in EV marketshare. It's great that they have gained a bit in ICE marketshare, but that's not the discussion here. All signs point to EV marketshares becoming much bigger than what people expect. China and EU are already 20%, when they were 2% five years ago. The growth is tremendous, way more than what optimists like me expected. So am I to believe Toyota will release EVs and magically start taking a chunk of that marketshare by default? Maybe it will but I need evidence to believe that.
Once again, I will go back to the first paragraph in my previous post. I am not taking strong stance on any side, I am simply trying to find out what makes you so confident in Toyota when evidence points out it's far more ambiguous than that.
Reliability and quality is about more than engines and transmissions. Paint quality problems, bubbling displays, panel misalignments, hvac issues, wind noise, creaky plastics, and tail light condensation are all issues an auto manufacturer might want to avoid, for instance.
Yes, but powertrain is the big differentiator here. I would never buy a Chevy crossover over a Japanese/Korean one for example. But for an electric version, I wouldn't worry too much about AC issues or panel gaps, as the basic package is reliable.