Chief executive officer Takanobu Ito became the star at Honda Motor Company while he is working on the NSX, company’s most powerful sports car. Ito is now focusing on the fuel efficiency since Honda’s leading position was threatened by Ford Motors and Hyundai Motor company in North America.

After axing its V- 10 NSX car project in 2008, Honda is reinforcing efforts to give a boost on fuel efficiency to compete with the growing competition.

According to Tadashi Usui, an analyst Moody’s K.K in Tokyo, the difference between Japanese automakers and its rivals is shrinking.

Since Ito was not pleased with the size and fuel economy of Honda civic so he postponed the release of that model .

In an interview at Honda research it was revealed that now the first priority including the design shape and pricing will be on fuel efficiency.

Honda’s sales got 13 percent gain till May with a growth of 17 percent to 23 percent, while Ford’s rose to 31 percent. Hyundai’s Sonata sedan tops Honda’s top- selling Accord in economy and horsepower, and its revamped Elantra compact promises to use less fuel than Honda’s Civic.

The second largest automaker has focused on fuel efficiency, risking its “ green” reputation. For example, Honda uses 5-speed automatic transmissions and seems unwilling to use turbocharging technology and direct- injection.

According to a former Hyundai product planner, they have been purely leapfrogged in new engine technologies an even earlier this green thing was big, they were into green.

In the 2009 model-year survey, Hyundai-Kia group vehicles were second, with an average of 23.4mpg. According to EPA, Hyundai models alone, exceeded Honda’s fleet excluding Kia Motors corporation, with an average of 23.9 mpg.

In the U.S Environment Protection Agency’s fuel efficiency assessment, Honda’s U.S fleet of Honda and Acura 2009 models had an average of 23.6 mpg.

Just after two weeks when Suzuki recalled over 46,000 XL-7 and Grand Vitara SUVs because of faulty pulleys, things have gone from bad to worse for Toyota Motors. It has now come up with the excessive fuel leakage problem in Lexus HS250h during the rear government -impact crash tests.

According to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration posting on its website, the fuel leakage which exceeded the federal limits can lead to fires and it was discovered while striking the car from the rear at about 50 mph in an annual federal safety test.

The world’s largest automaker has not yet found a solution for this big problem. NHTSA posting also revealed that the automaker has not even determined when the safety recall will start. Though, in the development of 5the 2010 Lexus Hybrid, similar tests were conducted by the company where no fuel leakage problems were identified. Then why this difference has arise, this is the intriguing question.

Now Lexus is sincerely and vigorously working towards identifying the reason for the unmatched test results. Due to this reason, Lexus dealers have also stopped the sales orders of this car model. Around 17,000 sedans for US market have been adversely affected by this recall.

Earlier, Toyota company had also phased out older models LS 460 and LS 600h from the road, to solve the temporary wheel problem of the two models in this year .

Toyota motors are one of the leading automakers in the automobile industry but once again the company’s reliability has been compromised because of this recent recall and stoppage of sales orders. Until any remedies are found out, and the issue is clearly understood the sales will not give any deliveries of the involved car models.

Toyota company is taking the test results seriously into consideration and appreciate the NHTSA bringing its concern to them.