Honda Motor Co., Japan's second- largest carmaker, plans to open a new hybrid plant by 2013 while scrapping plans to build a mini-vehicle factory, Nikkei English News reported.
Honda will resume construction of the hybrid plant in Saitama prefecture north of Tokyo, which had been suspended, Nikkei reported, without saying where it got the information. The automaker has decided to drop plans "entirely" for a 50 billion yen ($567 million) minivehicle plant in Yokkaichi, Mie prefecture, the report said.
Yasuko Matsuura, a spokeswoman for the Tokyo-based carmaker, declined to confirm or deny the report.
Honda fell 1.7 percent to 2,694 yen as of 9:30 a.m. in Tokyo trading, while the benchmark Nikkei 225 Stock Average declined 1.1 percent.
The carmaker's decision to cancel the minicar factory also means it won't develop new commercial minivehicles, Nikkei reported.
