[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

I'm curious at the moment about a specific brand, but maybe an enduring thread about other brands would be of use to people (or myself in the future!)

Specifically in this post I'm curious about Honda.  There have been Honda branded fictional vehicles ever since 1st edition.. does anyone recall reading anything anywhere that specifies a AA or AAA owner of the Honda brand?  Or if it is a stand-alone corporation in the Sixth World?

[Tecumseh]

Rigger 3 (p. 19) lists Honda as "third-tier multinational" that's not affiliated with any AAA corporation. I would take that to mean that Honda is an independent A-rated corporation.

(In contrast, the book implies that Chrysler-Nissan and Ford, and perhaps Saab, are "second-tier" AA corps.)

[Longshot23]

According to SR4 Corporate Guide and SR5 Market Panic, Honda is amalgamated with GM under the Ares umbrella. I had expected one of the Japancorps . . . or EVO . . .

[Tecumseh]

Longshot is correct. Looks like something interesting happened to Honda between 3rd and 4th Edition.

I guess I'm not that surprised; it's hard to survive as an A-rated corporation. Plus, if Chrysler-Nissan can end up in bed together then why not GM-Honda. Modern day Honda has, what, 30 or 31 manufacturing plants, of which only 6 or so are actually located in Japan. Even if Ares lost Honda HQ and the assets in Japan, they'd still come away with a significant portion of the manufacturing capacity.

[Reaver]

Honda/Gm makes some sense, if you look at the company histories.
They worked together in the 90s on the compact car market with GM producing the bodies for both GM and Honda while Honda made the engines....

And I only know this from my own subcompact car at the time (Body by GM, Engine by Honda, Sold by Suzuki... go figure!)
 

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Thanks for the finds!

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

... though 'Third Tier multinational' would still be considered AA, since A-rated are national, not multinational.  They'd just be considered a 'small' AA corp.

[Tecumseh]

Wyrm, A rating = multinational. Corporations that are only national don't have a rating.

It's possible that Honda was a small AA in 3rd Edition, but Rigger 3 called AA-corps "second tier" and broke out "third-tier multinationals" separately (including Honda), which is why the context suggested to me that Honda was A-rated.

That's how I read it. If having Honda be AA-rated makes more sense for a given game then it's not much of a stretch.