A new report suggests that Toyota is losing money by exporting its hot-selling Corolla from Japan to other markets. To combat this, it might ramp up production at other facilities – namely those in North America.
Toyota currently builds more than half of its Corollas for the United States and Canadian markets at its plant in Cambridge, Ontario. Prior to the break up of the NUMMI plant in Fremont, California, that it operated with General Motors, Toyota had two North American assembly plants for the Corolla. When GM pulled out of its NUMMI deal, Toyota was no longer able to profitably operate the plant and it transfered capacity to Cambridge and back home to Japan.
Toyota is set to open a new manufacturing plant in about a year in Mississippi, but until then, North America-bound Corollas are built in Japan and Canada. Toyota exports about 60 percent of the 235,000 Corollas the automaker builds at its Takaoka, Japan, facility, as well as two subsidiary plants in Japan.
“At the current exchange rate, the more Corollas Toyota ships overseas, the more money it loses,” Advanced Research analyst Koji Endo told Reuters.
The yen has hit a 15 year high against the dollar, further eroding Toyota’s ability to export Japanese-built Corollas to North America.
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1.’Toyota may end…’ view
