Tsuchida joins the MNAO team with more than 22 years of experience at Mazda’s headquarters in Hiroshima, Japan. He most recently served as the Chief Designer of the latest generation of Mazda3, which launched in November 2018. He was also the Chief Designer of the Kai Concept, and in the late 2000’s Tsuchida worked in the Design Studio at MNAO, where he led design on the Furai concept car. Tsuchida began his career at Mazda specializing on exterior design, and in the late 1990’s and in the early 2000’s was lead designer for Mazda3, CX-7 and the Ryuga concept car.

Tsuchida’s approach to design focuses on timeless beauty, and in his designs, he aspires to evoke strong human emotion to give them energy and enthusiasm. His favorite Mazda is the RX-7, and is an avid surfer.

Compared to other carmakers, Mazda puts design at the forefront and with that, they run five design studios in three continents. These studios are run independently from one another, all supervised by Ikuo Maeda, Mazda’s Design Chief. All use KODO’s guiding principles, and Mazda runs an internal contest to see which designs are best. Twice a year they meet and deliberate to see which design need to be explored further and be brought to production.

Each product may have a specific product in mind, say the CX-9 for the North American market, but every design studio has input in order to achieve the best balance between Mazda’s design philosophy and the prevailing market tastes.

While the Mazda3 is considered to have a pure Japanese aesthetic, it’s understood that the upcoming all-new CX-5 is designed with the American buyer in mind. Regardless, Mazda wants all of their design to inspire people.