I’m not talking disingenuously, I’m all pro-electric. In fact it looks like my next car will be a Taycan, unless something changes unexpectedly.
But counting engine rebuilds as an inevitable matter of life is rather disingenuous too. My other (“hobby”) car is a 1977, so that’s 47 years now, and still on the original engine and transmission. This is not an uber-reliable statistical anomaly: it’s an unreliable piece of shit (a handmade sports car from a small manufacturer) but despite that, the block is still solid and original. Engine rebuilds are not common, unlike batteries which have an ever-degrading chemistry no matter how good they are.
And I strongly disagree on good design being a single point mass of over 700 kg concentrated in one block. The “skateboard” around suspension components and chassis is the most common design for a reason.
I’m not a lawyer but, I know when you file for a patent you can do that in just one country or internationally (which is significantly more expensive). Skimming through the Wikipedia article it seems to be talking about that, but first you need to have filed for the patent internationally and not in just one country.
From what I’ve read about this topic, it sounds like this is a patent active in Japan only.