The Tesla automotive-battery partnership and the Gigafactory: from home appliances to “batteries that drive” (2014)
The automotive version of “buying parity”
The partnership with Tesla can also be read as the automotive version of the 1952 Philips alliance. Back then Matsushita “bought,” on equal terms, a footing of its own in technology, with sales and management strength as the consideration. With Tesla, Panasonic offered battery technology and Tesla offered an outlet in the car; each brought its strength and they assembled them into one factory. Striking one strength against the other side’s strength to reach a balance — one can see it quietly resonating with the negotiating cadence Konosuke showed in his bout with Philips.
There is, however, a decisive difference. Opposite Philips, Matsushita was the side being taught the technology. Opposite Tesla, it has come round to the side providing the battery technology. Over some sixty years, this company shifted its position from the side that introduces technology to the side that supplies it. What made that possible was the battery it inherited from Sanyo and polished itself. From a home-appliance company to a company whose batteries make cars run — the partnership with Tesla can be seen as one sure step in that long migration.
Revenue and net margin, FY2009–FY2019
Revenue in ¥ bn (bars) and net margin in % (line), for the years around the decision. Shaded columns are FY2014 onwards — after it was taken.
Source: securities reports
Read the full dossier in Japanese →
The Japanese edition carries the complete record of this decision — the situation that forced it, the options weighed, what actually followed, and the sources behind every claim.
Other key decisions at Panasonic Holdings
- 1933 Introducing the division system: product-based, self-accounting autonomy (1933)
- 1952 The Philips technical alliance: “five and five, on equal terms” (1952)
- 1964 The Atami Conference and the new sales system: a reform that began with “Matsushita was at fault” (1964)
- 1990 The $6.1 billion MCA buy, and a five-year retreat: breaking with the “Konosuke line” (1990)
- 2001 Nakamura Kunio’s “destruction and creation”: dismantling the division system and taking five group firms fully in-house (2001)
- 2013 Exiting plasma television: folding up ¥500 billion of in-house production (2013)
- 2021 The Blue Yonder acquisition and the shift to a holding company: re-forming into an “operating-company system” (2021)
- 2025 Cutting 10,000 jobs at home and abroad amid strong results: reforming the fixed-cost structure (2025)
Yen amounts are converted at the average rate of each figure’s own year — not today’s rate; the revenue chart is shown in yen. Exchange rates & sources — the full ¥/US$ table →
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