“Made in Japan” once settled the question of quality before a buyer reached the specifications. For companies such as Toyota, Sony and Panasonic, decades of perceived reliability gave the name commercial weight.
That weight is no longer easy to infer from reputation alone.
In our qualitative research with 79 Gen Z participants across India, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines, Japanese brands were associated with safety, durability and understated quality. Some participants used them as a psychological safety net when making an important purchase. But trust was conditional on functional value, maintenance costs and reliable after-sales support.
The study was not designed to measure willingness to pay. That is precisely the gap companies now need to close.
Across the six ASEAN markets tracked by PwC, Japanese manufacturers still accounted for about 57 percent of light-vehicle sales in 2025, while Chinese manufacturers reached about 11 percent. The figure does not prove that Japanese quality matters less or that buyers have stopped paying for it. It shows that historical market dominance and perceived quality can no longer be treated as the same thing.
Brand health and commercial health can move apart
Sony makes the distinction unusually visible.
In Campaign Asia and Pureprofile’s 2025 electronics ranking across six Southeast Asian markets, Sony ranked fifth, with 86 percent brand awareness. Samsung ranked first. Sony remained widely recognized in a category where Japanese brands still scored highly for quality and dependability.
The commercial scale of the television business looked very different. TrendForce forecasts TCL’s 2025 global TV shipments at nearly 31 million units, compared with fewer than 4 million for Sony. In March 2026, Sony and TCL signed definitive agreements to form a new joint venture for Sony's home-entertainment business. TCL will hold 51 percent and Sony 49 percent. BRAVIA Inc. is expected to begin operations in April 2027, subject to regulatory approvals and other conditions.
The transaction does not prove that Sony’s reputation weakened or that pricing pressure caused the deal. It reveals a measurement problem. High awareness and favorable brand perceptions can coexist with very different outcomes in scale, cost structure and competitive position.
A brand tracker can tell executives that people still know and respect the name. It cannot tell them, on its own, what economic return that respect is producing.
Durability can outlast economic value
Durability remains one of the clearest strengths associated with Japanese products in our interviews. One participant described paying more for something that lasted longer as economically sensible because its cost could be spread over a longer period of use.
The value of those extra years depends on whether the customer still wants the product by then.
Japan’s Cabinet Office found that, among households replacing major durable goods in the year to March 2025, the previous refrigerator had been used for an average of 13.5 years, the television for 10.5 years and the washing machine for 10 years. Breakdown remained the main reason for replacement.
But 21.3 percent of television replacements were attributed to moving to a higher-grade product. The figure was 27.6 percent for computers and 24.3 percent for mobile phones.
The data does not show that consumers value durability less. It shows that physical failure is not the only end point. A product can still work after some of its economic value has expired.
That matters in categories where display technology, software support, connectivity or performance can advance faster than hardware deteriorates. The useful research question is therefore no longer simply whether consumers value longevity. It is how many additional years they expect to use, and what they will pay for them.
After-sales infrastructure changes the economics of ownership
Cars create a different equation because purchase price is only one component of value. Repair access, parts availability, servicing and resale all shape the years after the showroom transaction.
In July 2026, Maruti Suzuki opened its 6,000th service touchpoint in India. The network now reaches more than 3,000 cities and towns and includes workshops, smaller service formats and mobile services. The company added 502 service touchpoints in the 2025–26 financial year alone.
That reach does not prove a buyer will pay more for the car. It creates a concrete ownership benefit that can be measured: how much value consumers place on accessible servicing, spare parts and reduced inconvenience when something goes wrong.
Toyota’s move in Indonesia extends the logic into the used-car market. In 2025, Toyota Motor Asia invested $120 million for a 40 percent stake in Astra Digital Mobil, owner of OLXmobbi. The business has more than 30 stores and inspection centers across ten major Indonesian cities. Astra says the partnership aims to modernize the used-car market and improve access to vehicles, financing, insurance and after-sales services.
Toyota has therefore taken a direct strategic position in infrastructure that extends beyond the first sale. For executives, that widens the definition of quality. In a durable category, the economic proposition can include the system around the product as well as the product itself.
Provenance is becoming harder to isolate
The meaning of “Japanese” is also becoming more complex when brand origin, product development, technology and manufacturing come from different places.
Toyota and Suzuki’s collaboration in India is a useful example. In 2022, the companies announced that Toyota Kirloskar Motor would manufacture a new SUV developed by Suzuki, with both companies selling versions in India. The vehicle combined a mild-hybrid system developed by Suzuki with a strong-hybrid system developed by Toyota.
A Toyota customer could therefore be looking at a Japanese badge on a Suzuki-developed vehicle, manufactured in India and incorporating technology from both companies.
That matters because “Japanese provenance” may carry several distinct signals: the brand, the engineering, the country of manufacture, the quality assurance or the technology. Treating them as one country-of-origin effect can obscure which part customers actually value.
Local adaptation therefore changes more than communications. It can change the architecture of the offer while the heritage brand remains constant. Companies need to know which elements of that heritage are valuable enough to standardise and which need to change by market.
Measure the premium, not just the reputation
Our qualitative research identifies what participants were weighing: dependability, longevity, maintenance cost and after-sales support. It also shows that Japanese brands can reduce perceived purchase risk.
It cannot tell a company the monetary value of those advantages.
That requires a research design that isolates them. Start with closely controlled product propositions. Hold specifications, warranty, retailer, and service conditions constant while varying provenance cues and price.
The cues should be separated rather than bundled. A Japanese brand, Japanese engineering, manufacture in Japan, and local manufacture are not necessarily the same signal. Respondents can then make choices at different price premiums, allowing a discrete-choice or conjoint model to estimate how much each cue contributes to preference and where the advantage begins to disappear.
A second stage can introduce the practical benefits historically associated with the reputation: warranty length, repair costs, service-network access, software support and used-product support.
If willingness to pay persists when Japanese provenance is present and the practical benefits are held constant, heritage itself is carrying economic weight. If the premium appears mainly when service, longevity or ownership benefits are added, investment should follow those attributes. If the acceptable premium falls below the price position the business requires, another brand campaign will not close the gap.
The strategic decision follows from the measurement
The costly mistake is using brand health to answer a pricing question.
Awareness, trust, and consideration still matter. They tell executives whether the brand enters the decision with an advantage. They do not establish the price a customer will accept, which attribute produces that premium or what the company must invest in to preserve it.
That distinction changes where capital goes. A company that finds customers are paying for service reach should treat the network as part of the value proposition. If local product configuration matters more than provenance, market input needs to enter before product and pricing decisions are locked. If Japanese engineering itself commands a measurable premium, the company has evidence for protecting and communicating it.
The next generation of brand research has a harder job than confirming that Japanese companies remain respected.
It has to put a price on what that respect is worth.
Download Asian Gen Z and the Future of Japanese Brands to explore what the 79 in-depth interviews conducted across India, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines revealed about trust, value and the changing role of Japanese brands in their lives.
FAQs (drawing from the study and verified desk research)
How do Gen Z participants in the study perceive Japanese brands?
Participants across India, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines associated Japanese brands with reliability, safety, durability and functional quality. Those perceptions could reduce purchase anxiety, but participants also weighed maintenance costs, practical value and after-sales support.
Does the study prove that Gen Z will no longer pay a premium for Japanese brands?
No. The research was qualitative and was not designed to estimate willingness to pay. It identifies the factors participants considered, but a controlled pricing or choice study is needed to measure the monetary value of Japanese provenance or reputation.
Why can physical durability become less valuable in some categories?
Japan’s Cabinet Office data shows that some televisions, computers and mobile phones are replaced because households move to a higher-grade product rather than because the old product failed. In fast-moving categories, a product can therefore remain functional after some of its economic value has expired.
What should Japanese brands measure differently?
Separate reputation from willingness to pay. Controlled choice research can vary brand origin, engineering provenance, manufacturing origin and price while holding other attributes constant, then test how service, repairability, software support and resale infrastructure change the premium consumers will accept.