Journalist

I was quite surprised with today’s announcement, but what I want to know more is about President Toyoda’s true feelings about BEVs.

I think you have a lot of aspirations for hydrogen and hybrids, and your true thoughts have been made public on many occasions, but for battery EVs, I think it’s more like “here, we’re doing it” - kind of a business-like presentation.

I want to clarify this. Personally, President Toyoda, do you like BEVs or not? If it’s difficult to respond as the president of the company, you can respond as driver Morizo.

Akio

If I had to make an answer, I was not interested in Toyota’s past BEVs, but I am getting interested in the BEVs that we are now developing for the future.

After improving my driving skills, I test-drove a battery electric Toyota 86 for the first time here at MEGA WEB. The comment that I gave after my test drive was that “it’s an electric vehicle.”

We have the Lexus brand and the Toyota brand, and we are an OEM pursuing distinctiveness in each brand. But when it comes to BEVs, a car becomes more like a commodity.

I think you saw my honest feeling inside me. Of course I supported BEVs in terms of business, but the question was whether I was supporting them as driver Morizo.

I’m a master driver, and in the training I had gone through back in the days, I always drove an FR vehicle.

But recently, I now participate in rally races and the Super Taikyu races. In these motorsports, I now drive a four-wheel drive vehicle as well. My sensibility as a master driver has changed with these vehicles.

I now think that electric motors have higher efficiency than gasoline-only-powered vehicles. If we have a good four-wheel drive platform, it can become an FF vehicle or an FR vehicle through control technology.

So, with that kind of control technology, I think Morizo will be able to drive fast and safe on any circuit or rally course.

Nori-san (rally driver Norihiko Katsuta) has won the All-Japan Rally Championships this year. The professional drivers of ROOKIE Racing are very active in motorsports at various circuits.

Those driving skills of professional drivers are reflected in our vehicles to make them safer and more fun-to-drive. I have such expectations.

At the same time, this platform has enabled us to make vehicles that allow amateur drivers like me to enjoy driving on various roads, however rough, whether it’s a mountainous road or snowy road or whatever. This is a big change in our company.

Control technology plays a key role there, but it alone can’t push major improvements. If we try to create driving flavor only through control technology, it's like adding crispy tempura to overcooked noodles.

But over the past several years, starting with our Toyota New Global Architecture (TNGA) initiatives, we have made steady improvements in the vehicles’ basic frame, chassis and body rigidity, under the banner of “let’s make ever-better cars.”

We also opened the Shimoyama proving ground, and we are now testing and developing cars under these tough conditions.

With this environment, I think we are now at a point where we can develop safer and faster vehicles with more fun-to-drive aspects. I look forward to developing such BEVs as well moving forward.

That’s why it’s not just a business matter anymore. Even as driver Morizo, I have strong expectations for and desire to give my feedback to our development, such as “making this kind of cars would be fun” or “we want to create our unique autonomous driving as an automaker even in the era of autonomous driving.”

We will continue to make serious efforts in BEVs and other powertrains such as fuel cell electric vehicles, hybrid electric vehicles, and gasoline-only vehicles that have exciting sounds.

I’m still quite serious about them as Morizo and as the president of Toyota. We’re working with our colleagues and partners very seriously in all of these fields. We want to provide customers with vehicles that can make them happy.