Toyota to invest $1 billion in North America
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The largest investment in Mexico to date.
This state-of-the-art plant will feature the latest TNGA production engineering innovations, employ approximately 2,000 team members and have the capacity to produce 200,000 units annually.
Once Corolla production begins in Mexico in 2019, Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada Inc. (TMMC) will transform its Cambridge, Ontario North Plant to switch from producing Corollas to mid-sized, higher-value vehicles, marking Toyota's first major reinvestment in the plant since it opened in 1997.
Toyota will also make significant new investments over several years in TMMC's assembly plants in Cambridge and Woodstock, Ontario to implement TNGA modifications, maintaining the facilities' importance as a strategic manufacturing hub.
Toyota's vehicle assembly facility in Guanajuato will begin producing the Corolla with Model Year 2020. The new plant will be Toyota's 15th in North America, its first since 2011 and its largest investment in Mexico to date.
The plant will be the first in the world designed from the ground up with TNGA production engineering technologies and will leverage the existing robust supply base and transportation infrastructure in the region. Toyota will also establish a plant preparation office in the state of Queretaro.
Toyota will realign production at its Cambridge and Woodstock, Ontario assembly plants; all three plants will then produce mid-sized vehicles of higher value. The TNGA adjustments at these plants will require major modifications to the two assembly plants in Cambridge and the one in Woodstock. These significant new investments will take place over the next several years.
The Woodstock plant will continue to manufacture the RAV4, a vehicle competing in a rapidly growing segment. The Cambridge South Plant will continue to build the Lexus RX 350 and 450h, the newest models of which were recently unveiled.
By 2019, the Cambridge, Ontario plants will all be producing higher-value mid-sized vehicles, along with Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Kentucky, Inc. (TMMK) and Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Indiana, Inc. (TMMI). The new facility in Mexico and Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Mississippi, Inc. (TMMMS) will build the Corolla, consolidating compact vehicle production to the southern U.S. and Mexico.
These groupings by common vehicle platform follow Toyota's consolidated truck production at its San Antonio, Texas and Baja California, Mexico plants, which has helped streamline Tacoma and Tundra assembly while better leveraging the supply chain. ■