Hello everyone,
I am a new member in this forum and although I have not been very active with my car recently,
I thought I would share some memories of M2 Incorporated where I personally purchased my M2 1001 in 1992.
Firstly, I would like to start off by writing about how I was introduced to M2 1001!
My first MX-5 was in fact a V-Special which was to me a love at first sight when I saw the prototype at the 1989 Tokyo Motor Show.
After seeing the prototype, I headed straight to a nearby Mazda dealer to reserve one and my brand new baby was delivered in April 1990.
According to the dealer staff, mine was the 3rd car delivered at the dealership.
Driving the freshly delivered V-Special was truly rewarding.
My very first new car, that alone made me feel great, but everywhere I went, people stopped to take a glimpse at it.
Those moments do not come by these days, unless one is driving an Italian supersports!
Wait, you brought a M2-1001 through the Mazda ballot?
I had a M2-1002, but its now in Italy.Interesting when I tore through that car how many parts were hand fabricated.
Where is the rest of this story???
saz9961
I read about your M2 1002 acquisition in a recent Italian Car magazine where you and another Private Mazda Museum owner was introduced.
Yes, I did purchase my M2 1001 through a draw, in which the first lot was an open draw held at the M2 Headquarters and mine was the second draw.
The M2 1002 did not sell very well (I was told by an M2 staff that they only sold approx. 100 units).
I doubt that there is any M2 models still owned by the first owner.
AndyMk2
I will be posting the rest of my story on a daily basis (if I can manage).
After receiving the Eunos Roadster V-Special, I drove the car in Japan for 6 months.
Subsequently, I was due to relocate to Germany, where I took the V-Special with me.
I was 19 years old back then!
After completing the MOT in Germany, it was time to register the car but there was one major challenge.
As a young driver, the insurance cost was outrageous (at the time, a full coverage insurance policy was close to 5000 DM) and could not afford the policy.
After careful contemplation, I decided to part from my V-Special and inserted an advert in “Auto Motor und Sport” magazine as there was no internet at the time.
The car was sold to a Dutch gentleman who resided in the UK, which was a perfect match as my car was obviously a RHD.
[quote=sskang]
saz9961
I read about your M2 1002 acquisition in a recent Italian Car magazine where you and another Private Mazda Museum owner was introduced.{/quote]
I had no idea
Yes, only 100. I think it was to do with the price, which I was told was the same as an RX7. The left over parts saw use in the Tokyo Limited NA8. Odd size tyres from the factory.
When the ND Roadster was launched, I noticed suddenly “quite a few” 1001s cropping up on the market. I think there are still some cars being kept back.
To my knowledge, 3 M2-1001s came to the UK; 1 ended up in Miataland, one is well known for having passed through a few car dealers, and was extensively rebuilt. A third was known to the original owner of the Miataland 1001, and its location was unknown. 2 M2-1002s are definetely known about, both now part of the Miataland collection. There was rumours of a 3rd one in Southern England.
3 M2-1028s known to me. One (white) surfaced in Northern Ireland, was restored, and sold to a Japanese buyer (so back in Japan). A blue one was imported by Autolinkuk, and is, guess what, part of the Miataland collection (needed a lot of restoration). There is a possibility of a third one, imported 2000-2003.
For years I had a draft article on M2-Inc, for the MX5OC magazine. Never got around to finishing it.
Shortly after selling my V-Special, I met a Japanese gent who was visiting a close German friend of mine who was well known in Japan
for his experience with vintage Japanese automobiles. I could recognize immediately that he was a car nut and we had some great chat during his stay.
In that conversation, I had told him that shortly ago, I had sold my MX-5 V-Special.
It was him, who knew Mr. Tachibana, the president of M2 Incorporated and explained to me that there will be a special edition of MX-5 which will be released.
This was indeed the M2 1001, and the gent sent me some PowerPoint slides explaining the concept of the car.
Upon my homecoming, the gent arranged a test drive of the M2 1001 as there was Hertz Rent-a-Car within the M2 incorporated building which rented two M2 1001 with
a serial number M2 1001 000 for rental use.
saz9961
The name of the magazine is called “Route Classich,” perhaps a Belgian car magazine with a cover photo of a Mini in green.
Indeed, you are correct about the M2 1002.
M2 Incorporated sold only 100, since the car costed slightly less than twice the price tag of a stock MX-5.
I think the appearance of other M2 models after the release of ND is related to the fact that the NA prices soared in Japan, due to the fact that NA appeared on the TV advert of ND.
As for the M2 1001, thank you for providing me the information.
I am quite confident that one car was imported to Germany which I know because the MOT is much more stringent here than in the UK.
Fortunately, I was able to obtain a data sheet from TUV (German MOT) which is an indication that someone registered it in Germany.
I am puzzled about why a M2 1028 was re-exported to Japan from Ireland.
There are still cars on sale in Japan and considering the pain of importing it, it must have been a lot less expensive!
On the day my friend (for convenience sake, I will call him Mr. F) arranged a test drive for myself and another friend,
Mr. F had also arranged a meeting with Mr. Tachibana, who personally explained us the concept of M2 1001. This meeting was held on the third floor salon of M2 headquarters.
I can clearly recall breaking the ice by talking about his Rolex Daytona which he had on his wrist.
He explained to me that he purchased the watch when he was still a student, which made perfect sense since he wore the hand winding Daytona from the 60s.
The meeting was a very emotional experience especially because I had never been explained about a vehicle concept by the owner of the project.
The test drive was very memorable for two reasons.
Firstly, I could immediately recognize that M2 1001 was quite a different car in comparison with a stock MX-5.
Secondly, my friend who was with me on the test drive had caused an accident!
A few words about Hertz’s rental service.
As I’ve mentioned previously, there was a Hertz office located in the M2 building.
Due to the nature of M2 1001, there were numerous accidents involving both rental cars.
To the best of my knowledge, this service ended rather quickly, much earlier than the folding of M2 incorporated.
Achievements by M2 Incorporated
As most of you may be aware of, M2 Incorporated was a subsidiary of Mazda for exploratory purposes.
The company’s goal was to manufacture vehicles in smaller lots and enable bilateral communication between the manufacturer and the user.
M2 1001 being the first model by M2, there were numerous events organized by M2 involving purchasers of M2 1001.
M2 1001 owners were invited to participate in three drivers’ events led by Mr. Tachibana, the president of M2 at the time.
The first event was a briefing session held at the basement garage of M2, which was accessible through the car lift located adjacent to the main entrance.
I have attached an image from such briefing session which was presented by Mr. Tachibana, which I have taken from a seasonal communication magazine of M2 Incorporated
called M2 Voice. There were a total of 16 (perhaps a few more but not sure) issues published before M2 was closed down.
The revelation that some of the M2s were part of a Hertz rental fleet is very interesting. What happened to those cars. If they were both numbered 000, then there were more 1001s that statements suggested.
"For years I had a draft article on M2-Inc, for the MX5OC magazine. Never got around to finishing it."
Can I encourage you to finish it and get it published Saz? Sounds like it would make a genuinely interesting story (and definitive [-ish] record of fact) in amongst the proliferation of ‘where we went on our holidays’ articles.
Steve
The image here is a sticker that was given to all participants of the M2 1001 Owners’ Event as shown on the image of my previous posting.
There were two other events which I regrettably could not participate and they came with the same graphics as this one, but the colors were different.
IIRC, the second event was Yellow, and the third event was in red.
I have only seen a few owners with all 3 stickers on an M2 1001.
saz9961
I am not quite sure what happened to the Hertz Rent-a-car M2 1001 but I could vaguely recall that one was totally damaged.
Next time I speak to a former M2 Incorporated staff, I could ask!
To the best of my knowledge, there were 5 units of M2 1001 produced with serial number M2 1001 000.
Three were used as PR vehicle for journalists by M2 and the remaining two were used for rent-a-cars.
These vehicles were never sold, which means the production unit of 300 for purchasers is correct.
I think one of M2’s PR vehicle is still owned by Mazda.
The price to rent an M2 1001 back in 1992 was a whopping 30,000 yen or 200 GBP!
M2 Voice (Seasonal publication issued by M2 Incorporated)
Here is an image of all M2 Voice I have in my collection which adds up to 16 issues.
The number of issues coincide with the years in which M2 existed.
I am fully convinced that Mazda was the first Japanese automotive firm to execute the concept of
“Tokyo Software Development Laboratory” which enabled the following:
Interested party could meet the vehicle developer him/herself and discuss about the car
Developer (staff) could receive direct feedback from users/potential customers
Above feedback could be employed for future vehicle development
Other Japanese makes such as Toyota tried something similar, but was never executed with M2 Inc.'s meticulousness.
I will be posting some exerts from these magazines with introduction to other services offered at M2 Building.
This is an image from M2 Voice Vol. 1, which is a drawing of the M2 Headquarters Building in Setagaya, Tokyo.
The building is currently owned by Memolead Tokyo, a funeral service company based in Tokyo.
The M2 Building was designed by Kengo Kuma, a famous Japanese architect who has also designed the learning center of Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne
and various other architectures. An interview with the man himself is a part of this issue.
The first volume of M2 Voice focused M2 1001, the first model to be launched by the company and the tagline was,
“For a man who knows what he wants.”
I firmly believe that M2 1001 was the realisation of Mr. Tachibana’s ideal MX-5, knowing that he was very fond of the Cafe Racer culture in the 60s.
He himself raced in vintage bike race with his Matchless at Tsukuba Circuit for many years and spent many years to replicate a Jaguar E-Type lightweight in his garage.
Now that I am back from my vacation, I would like to continue with this thread by explaining some of the functions at M2 Building.
The image here is en exert from the same volume of M2 Voice as in my previous posting.
M2 Cafe & Shop Granvia (Ground floor, at the base of the square construction on the left hand side)
When M2 opened, this area was a cafe & restaurant with an Italian taste which offered great ambience.
However, the cafe did not last very long and to the best of my knowledge, it closed within 2 years since M2 Building opened.
Although it is merely a speculation, the reason why they closed in such short time was poor business probably because
the street where M2 was located was on a very busy street (Kanpachi Dori, or circular route 8).
Although this street was famous for numerous domestic/imported car dealers, the number of visitors, especially on weekdays was
ironically very low.
The main showroom at M2 Building was the M2 Hall which was located on the second floor, underneath the downward slope of the
right hand side of the building. M2 Hall had the capacity of showcasing 2-3 cars in total and there was a reception desk where there were
two beautiful female staff, who were originally Mazda Miss Rotary (Mazda had a showroom in Harajuku, Tokyo for many years and female workers
there were called “Miss Rotary.”
The reception desk was placed in the vicinity of the stairs from the main entrance and the secondary entrance where the glass elevator was in service.