GM-Energy Dept. Research to Be Denied Japanese

General Motors and federal scientists said Thursday that they expect to deny foreign auto makers access to the fruits of their joint research, even though several Japanese auto firms are big U.S. producers and employers.

Already, a battery research consortium including the Big Three U.S. auto firms and the Energy Department has rejected requests by the Japanese to join, government officials said.

During a first-ever gathering of more than 200 federal scientists from 12 leading national research laboratories with GM’s own engineers and scientists, government officials also indicated that several more consortia--including one devoted to developing a hybrid electric vehicle--are in the works.

The new Energy Department budget includes a request for $20 million toward a consortium including the government and the Big Three to develop a vehicle that runs on electric power but also has a small backup motor, a senior government official said.

The electric-car consortia are among many joint research projects envisioned by the new collaboration with the federal research labs, intended to generate a national effort to improve U.S. industrial competitiveness.

“We’re going to do much, much more along these lines,” said Donald Runkle, GM’s vice president for advanced research, who initiated the contacts with the national laboratory system over the past year.

The collaborative effort is adapted from Japan’s elaborate ties between government and key industries. But the decision to exclude foreign-based firms that have become major U.S. corporate citizens and taxpayers underscores the complexity of such undertakings in today’s global economy.

Seven Japanese auto producers and up to 300 Japanese auto supply firms have gone into production in this country over the past decade, creating an estimated 100,000 American jobs. But Japan’s inroads against the U.S.-based industry has cost many more U.S. jobs than the Japanese have created, government-sponsored studies show.

With the deep wounds this has opened up between the two nations, there is little inclination in Washington to share with the Japanese any technology developed with taxpayer funds that supported the defense-oriented federal laboratories during the Cold War.

“It took 40 years to win the Cold War, and our competitors had a free ride. They used their resources well under the security blanket we provided,” Assistant Energy Secretary J. Michael Davis told scientists here Thursday.

Davis said a Japanese auto firm inquired last year about joining the U.S. Advanced Battery Consortium but was rejected. Automotive News has reported that Toyota and Japan’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry made separate, unsuccessful overtures late last year to join the consortium.

Toyota officials provided conflicting accounts Thursday.

Deputy Energy Secretary Reid Detchon said the consortium was first established by the Big Three, and they could reject or accept whoever they want.

Besides, Detchon said, “I don’t think we’d particularly disguise the fact that we’re interested in enhancing U.S. industrial competitiveness.”