At a press conference to discuss the company’s latest financial results, held a few hours before the launch of the sixth-generation RAV4 yesterday, Toyota CEO Koji Sato boldly declared: “A car is not a car if it’s not fun”.
Responding to a question about fewer cars being exciting and fun to drive these days, he went on to say “That’s why we will never allow our cars to become commodities”.
The sentiment echoes that of Toyota chairman Akio Toyoda, the driving force behind the Japanese giant’s Gazoo Racing (GR) performance sub-brand and models like the GR Yaris, GR Corolla, GR 86 and GR Supra.
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While it’s clear that mission statement still applies for the world’s biggest automaker, Sato-san also said he believes Toyota “can no longer sell cars just with model updates, slightly better fuel efficiency, or new designs” and that “unless that same passion [as sports cars] can be found in other types of cars, we won’t be able to reach customers”.
The CEO finished off his thoughts by stating: “I’m trying to instill this kind of mindset in each of our project teams. That is the Toyota I want to create, and I will continue working on that this year.”
So it seems the theme laid out by the automaker’s previous CEO, who remains at the firm as its chairman and “master driver”, not only remains but will be supported by more than just incremental improvements across its model range in future.
Toyoda-san took control of the family firm in 2009 when Toyota was in the thick of a recall scandal brought about largely by being too aggressive in chasing down sales stats and the global sales crown.
His turnaround plan included refocusing on quality, as well as making the company’s cars “fun to drive, again”. Not long into his tenure, the FT-86 concept debuted, which slowly morphed into the first-generation Toyota 86/Subaru BRZ.
With his well-known love for racing, he championed the elevation of his pet Gazoo Racing division to develop wickedly fast GR versions of the Yaris and Corolla, as well as the Supra.
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