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Toyota to Make 100,000 Units of Hybrid Car - Paper |
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| JAPAN: July 21, 2008 | ||
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TOKYO - Toyota Motor Corp plans to produce 100,000 units a year of a new hybrid-only model slated for release in 2009 at a subsidiary in southern Japan, the Nikkei business daily reported on Saturday.
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The new car, which will be Toyota's second dedicated hybrid model after the hot-selling Prius, will have a 2- to 2.5-litre engine and will also be sold under the company's luxury Lexus brandname, the paper said. Toyota Motor Kyushu Inc, in Fukuoka prefecture, currently builds a gasoline-electric hybrid version of the Toyota Harrier sport utility vehicle, sold as the Lexus RX outside Japan, as well as the Highlander SUV. Hit by sinking demand for fuel-thirsty SUVs and pickup trucks, Toyota this month announced a big overhaul of its North American manufacturing structure which included a plan to build the Highlander at a truck factory in Indiana from late 2009. Toyota Motor Kyushu will make adjustments to its factory to switch production from the North America-bound Highlander to the new hybrid model, the Nikkei said. Toyota aims to sell at least 1 million hybrid vehicles annually in the early part of the next decade -- more than double what it sold last year. Toyota has said it would showcase a new hybrid model under both the Toyota and Lexus brand names at the annual Detroit auto show next January. (Reporting by Chang-Ran Kim; editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
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