Toyota’s top man in Europe doesn’t believe Toyota would sacrifice market share and profitability to help struggling domestic rivals in the United States for political reasons.
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Takis Athanasopoulos, executive vice-president of Toyota Motor Europe, was responding to reports last week quoting Toyota Motor Corporation chairman Hiroshi Okuda reiterating that the automaker is likely to raise its vehicle prices in the United States to support struggling US carmakers.
Okuda had said Toyota may raise US prices on the occasion of introducing new versions of current models, building on earlier comments that such a move would make it easier for American automakers to follow suit to beef up their earnings.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a Toyota-hosted technology seminar near Frankfurt, Athanasopoulos, who has risen from heading the Toyota importer in his native Greece, said that such a move made “no commercial sense” and suspected that the outspoken chairman’s remarks had been misinterpreted.
He agreed the $US1,500-a-unit ‘healthcare legacy cost’ recently highlighted by GM was a situation brought about by a government approach to social care widely different from that in Europe but said it was not up to foreign automakers to help by hiking their prices.
Athanasopoulos then pointed out that Toyota does believe in helping rival makers by co-operative deals such as the supply of hybrid technology to Nissan and Ford, the small car joint venture with PSA in the Czech Republic and the engine joint venture with BMW that will produce a new motor for the Mini.
The TME chief also said he thought there was too much of a fixation on labour costs and that the full picture needs to be considered. He noted that workers at Toyota’s UK plant were more highly paid than those in eastern parts of Europe, but added that they were more highly skilled and educated, so that new model or production ramp-up and training costs offset their higher hourly rate.
“Labour costs account for only about 10% of the cost of the car,” so it is not a huge factor overall in the cost of production,” he said.
Graeme Roberts
