Inventors from around the world will take part in the Woven City project, which features an innovation base designed for rapid creation and testing.
The “for others” spirit lives on
As chronicled previously on Toyota Times, the Woven City concept was first raised in July 2018, during then-President Akio Toyoda’s visit to the Higashi-Fuji Plant after it had been selected for closure.
Employee
A part of me is eager to move to Tohoku and keep making cars. But some of us cannot make the move because of family and have no choice but to resign.
When I think about those people, it is hard to be enthusiastic about making the move.
Could you tell us what Toyota envisions for Higashi-Fuji moving forward?
President Toyoda
My vision is to transform this site into a vast connected city for testing things like automated driving, a place that can contribute to the future of carmaking for the next 50 years.
This idea is still in the conceptual stage, but I think if we have the will, we can make it happen.
Though yet to be approved by the company, President Toyoda later explained that he chose to reveal his vision because he felt that the workers who worried for their colleagues should be the first to hear it.
The plant employee who posed that question did so out of concern for his peers. This mindset of doing things “for others” underpins Woven City, as a value shared by everyone involved in the project.
Sata
The people at TMEJ are excited to see this place reborn. We want to make it so convenient for Inventors that they won’t want to work anywhere else.
This place will continue to change. Our goal on the construction team is to do everything we can to meet the ever-changing needs of Woven City’s Inventors.
Takeshima
The Inventor Garage was born out of a desire to ease the struggles and troubles faced by Inventors.
In designing the facility, we thought about how we can obtain effective feedback from residents and visitors, and how we might speed up the development process.
That led us to the Monozukuri Area, and from the planning stage, we brought in people from not only Toyota, but also those who worked at TMEJ’s Higashi-Fuji Plant, with its five-decade history of manufacturing.
Together, we explored ideas centered on Woven City’s Inventors.
We want to create a place where those TMEJ members who had to leave can return and engage in monozukuri together. That is our mission, and my personal motivation.
Each day, Toyota’s team continues to work “for others,” getting the Inventor Garage ready to share Japanese ideas with the world.
