Toyota aims to increase revenue in Europe by 30 percent
In Europe, Toyota has ambitious growth plans, powered by new models including a compact SUV.
Toyota aims to increase the Toyota and Lexus brand sales by 30% to 1.4 million by 2025 in its European market, which includes Russia and Turkey. The Toyota and Lexus car sales were 1.09 million last year, giving the brand a market share of 5.3 percent. As part of its five-year strategy named 'ACE2000,' the company expects its share to rise to 6.5 percent. The strategy requires the introduction of 40 new or revised electrified vehicles, including hybrids plug-in and full-electric vehicles.
The SUV will be priced below the C-HR and will compete against models such as the Volkswagen T-Cross, Peugeot 2008 and Renault Captur in a growing market. Much of the growth will come from the sales of the new small SUV that will make its debut in March at the Geneva auto show. Sales are set to begin 12 months later.
The vehicle will be made alongside the new-generation Yaris small hatchback at Toyota's plant in Valenciennes, France. The fact that that it's locally built indicates that it will be high volume, Toyota anticipates trading more than 100,000 units of the SUV a year. Half of Toyota's European project growth will come from sales of the small SUV, the new RAV4 plug-in hybrid, and announced Proace City compact van. The Proace is made by PSA Group and is similar to Peugeot and Opel Combo partners.
According to its European chief, Johan van Zyl, Toyota is not chasing a bigger market share at the expense of profits. A higher market share would optimize the business model to make sure that they have full utilization of resource potentials and increased economies of scale.
Toyota projects that by 2025, 70 percent of its European sales will be hybrid cars, up from now 52 percent. The automaker expects that plug-in hybrid would account for 10 percent and zero-emission vehicles, including battery-powered and fuel-cell cars, for another 10 percent.
Toyota plans to offer only in sports cars, off-road vehicles, and commercial vehicles pure combustion engine vehicles. The RAV4 SUV plug-in hybrid version will launch in the second half with an electric-only 65 km (40 miles) range and a CO2 emission figure of 29 grams per km as measured on the WLTP cycle. Toyota will launch one plug-in hybrid car before 2025.
Lexus is introducing this year's UX 300e hybrid SUV, the Group's first full-electric car in selected European markets. In the WLTP process, the compact SUV has a target range of 300 km (186 miles). Sales of the brand rose in the EU and EFTA by 14 percent to 87,206 vehicles. Harrison expects Lexus ' sales to increase by another 40,000 to 50,000 cars a year by 2025 and help Toyota achieve its goals of 1.4 million.
