Toyota Motor Corp. plans to adopt a uniform price structure with no discounts for a new passenger car to be produced for sale in China at its joint venture there, it was learned Wednesday.
Toyota will introduce the so-called one-price system in China for the sake of fairness, said Takashi Hasegawa, president of the venture, which is called Tianjin Toyota Motor Co.
In marketing the new vehicle, Toyota will target white-collar people in their 30s working in Shanghai and other coastal regions, which are more developed than inland areas of the nation, he said in an interview with Jiji Press.
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These people form a new high-income bracket and are serving as trendsetters in the Chinese market, Hasegawa noted.
Tianjin Toyota Motor, a venture with Tianjin Automobile Xiali Corp., plans to produce 30,000 units per year of a 1,300-c.c. passenger car, for sale through 60 dealerships. Production is scheduled to start in 2002.
Toyota will make active use of the Internet to promote its sales campaigns in China in view of the phenomenal spread of Internet use there, Hasegawa said.
The firm will specifically allow Internet users to cruise, in Chinese, content from terminals of Toyota’s Gazoo online information system, installed at dealers in Japan, he said.
Hasegawa said that if China, a huge consumer market, joins the World Trade Organization, another wave of consolidation will likely hit the world’s automakers.
He also said that he has been informed that Volkswagen AG of Germany and General Motors Corp. of the United States are preparing to focus on China’s young white-collar population to vie with Toyota.
To survive the potentially intense competition of the Chinese market, Toyota needs to offer vehicles of the same quality as those sold in Japan, he said.
