Aggressive Toyota, Lexus EV Plan Includes More Models, Surplus Exports
The new Toyota and Lexus EV plans include adding five new models in the U.S. by 2027 and exporting excess unsold inventory.
While electric vehicle sales have grown at a steady pace as of late, the world hasn’t gravitated toward those types of vehicles in the robust manner that many previously expected them to. As such, automakers have dialed back their EV-related investments and model line expansions in a big way, with Toyota recently announcing that it would be focusing more on hybrids in the short term. However, it seems as if the Japanese automaker has a rather aggressive plan in place for future Toyota and Lexus EV-branded models as well, one that includes a bit of a contingency if things don’t go as well as hoped.
According to a new report from Bloomberg, Toyota plans to launch two new American-built EVs next year, joining three imported models and two existing ones, expanding its electric lineup to seven offerings by 2027 with lithium-ion batteries produced at the automaker’s new Liberty, North Carolina battery plant. It’s a rather surprising announcement given the current state of the market, but it seems as if Toyota executives believe that EV adoption in the U.S. will retain its slow but steady pace in the near term.
“We’ll sell a little bit more every year and grow with the market,” said Cooper Ericksen, a senior vice president in charge of planning and strategy at Toyota Motor North America. “But we have to think about how many Canada will use, how many the US will use, and we can then export to other global destinations. BEVs right now aren’t incremental volume for us; They’re cannibalizing our volume. But in the future, we think it’s a really important segment that we don’t want to give up to the competition.”
Along with the existing Toyota bZ and Lexus RZ, this new lineup will soon include the bZ Woodland, CH-R, and a Lexus EV based on the ICE-powered ES. Otherwise, Toyota hasn’t provided much information about its other future EV models, but it remains to be seen just how they’ll be received – and ultimately perform – amid a general soft market for those types of models, however.
What makes this report more interesting is the fact that if Toyota can’t sell all of these future EVs it plans to build in the U.S., it has a bit of a backup plan in place – it would export those models to other markets. It’s a strategy that may wind up paying off, especially given the stiffer regulatory environment in places like Europe and the UK, where EVs are gaining market share at a more rapid rate than in the U.S.
Photos: Lexus
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