Mazda Motor Corp. Chief Executive Officer Masahiro Moro said the automaker’s business is likely to suffer in China due to stiff competition in the world’s biggest electric-vehicle market.

Moro, who embarked on a China tour shortly after he officially took the helm at Mazda in June, said he saw an industry in the middle of a transition that will have a lasting impact. The competition is much more severe than expected, he told reporters on Friday.

“China is progressing with a scary speed,” he said at his first media round table in Tokyo since assuming the CEO post last month at the company’s shareholders’ meeting. “Our sales in China, as well as earnings, will suffer,” he said. “It was good that I went there on day one.”

While Mazda’s China sales fell in April and May compared with same period last year, Moro vowed not to give up. The Japanese carmaker aims to introduce new EVs “one after another in China,” he said, with no plans to downsize. It’s targeting the fiscal year ending in March 2024 for the introduction of a sport utility vehicle in China in a bid to reverse its course, he said.

The company sold 84,282 vehicles in China in the fiscal year ended in March 2023, about 50% fewer than the same period the previous year.

Moro’s sense of urgency is being felt among some other Japanese carmakers as well. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. has suspended its China business indefinitely and plans to lay off staff after years of poor sales, a state of affairs driven in part by China’s transition to cleaner vehicles from gasoline-powered cars.

Not everyone is suffering, however, as both Toyota Motor Corp. and Nissan Motor Co. posted higher monthly sales in May.

--With assistance from Jinshan Hong.