Once sold as the Perodua Kenari, the Daihatsu Move will soon be discontinued

The Daihatsu Move was never sold in Malaysia but nonetheless it’s a car that’s familiar to many Malaysians, who were introduced to the little ‘tall-box’ genre ‘kei’ minicar via the Perodua Kenari, a rebadged version of the second generation Daihatsu Move.

The current sixth generation (LA150) Daihatsu Move will be the last in the Daihatsu Move’s genealogy. First launched in 2014, the Move is overdue for a replacement but according to a report from the Japanese media, Daihatsu will soon be terminating the Move (and Move Custom).

Increase in demand for better safety features and higher cost of exhaust emission standards compliance have bumped up the prices of many ‘kei’ cars – a category of tax-deducted minicars in Japan.

As a result, the price gap between these A-segment kei cars and slightly larger lower-B segment cars has reduced, and demand for the former has slowed.

Daihatsu, once Japan’s No.1 kei-car brand (Suzuki now hold the title, but Honda N-Box is best-selling model) is reportedly planning to re-organize its model line-up as demand for its kei cars has slowed while demand for slightly bigger, non-kei models like the Daihatsu Rocky has increased.

Both the Daihatsu Move and its funkier twin, the Move Custom, will reportedly be combined with the Move Canbus into a single model line.

Unlike the regular Move and Move Custom, the Move Canbus features sliding rear doors, something that is very important in Japan, where parking spaces are tight and the superior ease of exit/entry offered by sliding doors are very much appreciated.

Daihatsu doesn’t reveal sales numbers for the individual models of the Move series but cumulative 2021 sales for the entire Move range is down by nearly 10 percent year-on-year, totaling 31,600 units as of March 2021.