As the auto industry remains upended by component shortages, Toyota France CEO Frank Marotte was the guest on Good Morning Business this Friday, August 26.

Despite this complicated context, the manager still believes that the year will be better in terms of volumes than in 2021, in particular thanks to the launch of its new city car, the Aygo X (pronounced “Aygo Cross”).

“We’re going to have a year that will probably be 10% above last year’s levels,” Frank Marotte said. We launched the Aygo X, a small urban vehicle, in June, which is in the affordability segment for customers, a segment from which many of our competitors have withdrawn.”

Confident for the second half

Although after a summer shutdown, Stellantis discontinued production at the Sochaux plant, but also in Zaragoza, Spain, Frank Marotte is quite confident in Toyota, citing “significantly better indicators” than its competitor.

“Before the summer holidays we had a production forecast of 88% of our theoretical capacity. After the holidays we had good news about the supply of parts. We are close to 100%, so it is in August and that is the forecast for the coming months, the delivery forecasts of our customers are quite good, we are even seeing them rise compared to three weeks ago”, he assured.

For him, production will be able to meet demand, even improving the situation compared to the beginning of the year.

“Il already globally an industrial device that works well, even if the first six months in France, on a baisse des immatriculations de 15% dans un marché que est en baisse de 17%. Donc sur les six premiers mois on a Subi des problems comparable to ceux de nos compétiteurs mais en va rattraper au deuxième semester. August.”

California and Europe on track for zero heat in 2035

California has just announced a ban on the sale of thermal cars in 2035, the same deadline as the European Union. While he welcomes this goal, Frank Marotte nonetheless expresses some doubts about the ability of all manufacturers to respond in time.

“This is excellent news for ecology, after the important thing is that the 2035 stage would be impossible to reach according to some. It is a very strong ambition, which requires a lot of support and a lot of investment. The manufacturers that we are doing: Toyota invests 9,000 million euros a year to move towards this transition from thermal to something else.

On the part of Toyota, pioneer of the hybrid, now it is also committed to 100% battery electric, with the launch of its first zero-emission vehicle, the bZ4X, but also by hydrogen.

“We were the initiators, 25 years ago with hybrids, of the electrification of vehicles, so we started this journey long before the regulations imposed it on us. We are confident and have a product plan that is registered to meet regulatory requirements, explains Frank Marotte. Lexus will stop combustion engines from 2030 in Europe and Toyota will do so in 2035. We will go from hybrids, which account for the vast majority of our sales, to electric batteries and hydrogen to achieve zero emissions by 2035.”