Management change and less cooperation
Toyota was recently embarrassed by its subsidiary Daihatsu, when it emerged that the safety of certain models had been tampered with. The Japanese therefore intervene at Daihatsu and this, among other things, costs some top executives their positions at the company.
Toyota intervenes at the top of its subsidiary Daihatsu, which recently became embroiled in a safety testing scandal. Current Daihatsu Chairman Sunao Matsubayashi and President Soichiro Okudaira are resigning from their positions. In April, Toyota plans to announce a completely new management structure for Daihatsu. Two executives from other Toyota divisions will replace them. Masahiro Inoue, currently CEO of Toyota in Latin America and the Caribbean, will become Daihatsu’s new president. The person most responsible for the transition to electric driving at Toyota’s luxury brand Lexus, Masanori Kuwata, assists him as executive vice president.
Daihatsu, owned by Toyota since 2016, admitted late last year to decades of manipulating safety tests for its cars. During crash tests, different airbags were used than in the cars subsequently sold. Toyota now says that the test fraud was the result of too much pressure on factories to produce a lot. Toyota also announces that it will monitor Daihatsu’s foreign activities itself and Daihatsu is withdrawing from a partnership with Toyota and Suzuki.
Daihatsu resumed some of its domestic production on Monday. A company spokesperson confirmed this to the AFP news agency. The resumption comes more than a month after the suspension of all production activities due to the scandal. Production of Mazda’s Probox van and Familia van has resumed at the Kyoto plant. Daihatsu said last week that it would resume production of ten other models on February 26, after the Japanese Ministry of Transport confirmed that they met safety regulations.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl