Toyota’s Etios unit moves from learning to teaching curve

Hiroshi Nakagawa believes India has the potential to emerge a global powerhouse for Toyota’s EFC (entry family car) strategy.

The Etios is part of this plan, where India was the launch pad for the car. Today, the facility near Bangalore constantly gets executives from Toyota plants in Brazil, Indonesia and Thailand keen to check out how it works so efficiently.

“We have been supporting Brazil, where India plays the role of the ‘elder brother’. Many practices in this plant are shared with Brazil, which will also produce the Etios,” Nakagawa, Managing Director of Toyota Kirloskar Motor, told Business Line .

This is in line with the Japanese automaker’s way of working, where knowledge and best practices are shared and passed on within the fold. The Etios facility, also home to the Corolla and the Camry, is its second unit in India; the first assembles the Innova and Fortuner.

“I am impressed with the way our people here are reacting to the exercise with their counterparts in Brazil. In our first plant, we took learnings from others in the Toyota family but have now reached a point in the second facility where the process has been reversed,” Nakagawa said.

Components for Brazil

India will supply transmissions and other small components to the Brazilian operations. Toyota has planned a product from the same platform for Thailand’s Eco Car project. Plans are underway for a compact car in Indonesia which may be jointly executed with subsidiary, Daihatsu. When these plans materialise, India could play a big role in both projects.

The Toyota chief was head of the IMV (innovative international multipurpose vehicle) programme in Thailand over a decade ago. His goal then was to make the country the hub for all vehicles produced on this platform. Today, the same vision could work out in the EFC strategy, where India and Brazil are the prime movers.

The not-so-distant future could see ‘Etios families’ emerge from the core platform, on the lines of the IMV, which spawned a range of vehicles such as the Innova, Fortuner and Hilux pick-ups.

With the Etios, India will now be one of Toyota’s three pillars in the Asia-Pacific region, along with Thailand and Indonesia.

For the moment, Nakagawa and his team are busy studying the behavioural patterns in the market, which are completely in favour of diesel.

Diesel vehicles

As a result, Toyota’s component of petrol cars has been whittled down to 20 per cent. Yet, the company believes that new investments for diesel engines need to be carefully thought out, even while the weak rupee has made imports from Japan costlier.

“The logical way out is to focus on higher localisation and reduce imports. We are also keen on increasing exports but then there are not too many petrol car markets either. It is an interesting challenge,” says Sandeep Singh, Deputy Managing Director.

murali.gopalan@thehindu.co.in

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