Word: toyotas
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Nissan, for example, is pedal-to-the-metal with pure electric cars, having skipped fuel-cell technology altogether. It considers "interim hybrid technology," like Toyota's successful Prius, a mere passing phase. "The market-share winner will be the one that offers affordable, mass-market, zero-emission vehicles with a zero payback period for premium technologies," says Mark Perry, director of the product planning and strategy group for Nissan North America...
Then there is Toyota, the 800-pound hybrid gorilla. Toyota has yet a third route to success: muscling up on its hybrid strength...
Location was also probably a factor in Toyota's decision. It's very expensive to operate a plant in California, notes a senior executive with another Japanese automaker. Toyota can pretty easily shift production of the compact Corollas and Tacoma pickup trucks to other plants in Canada and Texas. (See the 50 worst cars of all time...
...Toyota's longstanding commitment to stable employment is being challenged by heavy losses the company has sustained over the past 15 months. It lost $7 billion during its last fiscal year, and more red ink is flowing this year. And the recession and the drop in auto sales in the U.S. saddled Toyota with excess capacity in the U.S., leaving it little choice but to cut production, says David Cole of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich. (Read "GM and Germany Still Wrangling Over Opel...
Further, GM's decision to leave NUMMI, which wasn't eligible for bailout money, made the plant any easy candidate for a shutdown, since Toyota's plants in Kentucky, Indiana, Texas and Alabama are all newer and nonunion, Cole says. United Auto Workers officials organized a large protest outside the NUMMI plant last week. (Read "Why Volkswagen Is Powering Through the Recession...