Parts Shortages Ripple Around the World

This is an interesting graphic from the Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shinbun nicely summarizing the way parts shortages and production halts caused by the earthquake in Japan are having knock-on effects around the world. As you can see from my translation below, these shortages are not just hitting the Japanese car makers. I guess this just emphasizes the fragility of a globalized economic system, in the same way that the interconnectedness of financial institution magnified the effects and rapidity of the economic crash of 2008.

• United Kingdom – Sony Ericsson are reporting that there is a risk that electronic components for mobile phones could be in short supply.
• Finland – Cell phone makers Nokia are also reporting risks of electronic component shortages.
• Korea – Renault and Samsung are bot reducing production levels due to concerns about parts shortages.
• United States – Ford has suspended sales of black and red vehicles due to a shortage of paint.
• United States – General Motors has suspended some truck production due to parts shortages.
• United States – Honda and Mazda are revising sales plans for models that are exported to the US from Japan.
• China – Production facilities belonging to the Japanese car makers in China have concerns about parts deliveries from April onwards.
• France – Peugeot Citreon Group report effects on their diesel engine production.
• Germany / Spain – Opel has temporarily stopped production at factories in Spain.

Actually, our business buying cars from the Japanese auto auctions and exporting them around the world has not experienced many issues resulting from the earthquake and its aftermath. First of all, we are based in Osaka, which is a long way from the areas directly hit by the disaster and we are shipping out of Osaka and Nagoya.

There have been a few smaller auctions that have been canceled, and some larger ones rescheduled, but overall the range and numbers of vehicles available in the car auctions has not really been affected. We have continued to buy from customers around the world.

As for shipping, the ports were all shut for one day due to tsunami warnings for the entire coastline of Japan. However, after that they all reopened and no shipments for our customers have experienced any delays at all.

The only other concern of come customers has been the radiation issue, but as I explained elsewhere there isn’t really any risk for a number of reasons. I encourage you to read the detailed explanation I wrote if you have any questions about that.