Introduction

Toyota Motor Corporation ( Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki-gaisha) , or TMC, is a Japanese multinational corporation that manufactures automobiles, trucks and buses. Excluding its half owned subsidiary Daihatsu, Toyota is the world's second largest automaker by sales. The headquarters of Toyota is located in Toyota, Aichi, Japan. Toyota also provides financial services through its subsidiary, Toyota Financial Services, and participates in other lines of business. It manufactures vehicles sold in the United States under the brand names Toyota, Scion and Lexus. Toyota also owns majority stakes in Daihatsu and Hino, and 8.7% of Fuji Heavy Industries, which manufactures Subaru vehicles.

Worldwide presence

Toyota has factories all over the world, manufacturing or assembling vehicles for local markets, including the Corolla. Toyota has manufacturing or assembly plants in the United States, Japan, Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Poland, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, France, Brazil, and more recently Pakistan, India, Argentina, Czech Republic, Mexico, Malaysia, Thailand, China and Venezuela.

Toyota invests a great amount of research into cleaner-burning vehicles such as the Toyota Prius, based on technology such as the Hybrid Synergy Drive. In 2002, Toyota successfully road-tested a new version of the RAV4 which ran on a Hydrogen fuel cell. Scientific American called the company its Business Leader of the Year in 2003 for commercializing an affordable hybrid car.

In 2003, Toyota brought two of its popular cars from Japan (including the bB) to America, and created a new badge, called Scion, meaning a descendant or heir. These cars are targeted towards the young, and young-at-heart. They are meant to be tuned up or be used as simple road cars. Both models, the xA (known in Japan as the Toyota ist) and xB (known in Japan as the Toyota bB) are powered by a 1.5L DOHC I4 engine. A third model, the Scion tC, was introduced in 2004. They are all typically low priced and are affordable. Instead of importing an existing model from Japan as was done with the xA and xB, the tC was designed specifically for the North American market, using the four-cylinder engine and transmissions from the Toyota Camry.

Toyota is also famous in industry for its manufacturing philosophy, called the Toyota Production System. This system is copied worldwide by many manufacturing companies.

In 2005, Toyota was the 4th largest auto company in the world in terms of sales with $135.82 billion trailing General Motors with $185.52 billion, Ford with $164.20 billion, and DaimlerChrylser with $157.13 billion. As of May 2006, Toyota was able to catch Daimler-Chrysler for 3rd place in total sales in the United States, with GM and Ford being 1st and 2nd respectively. Due to the high fuel prices and Toyota's emphasis on compact and mid-size cars, sales of the Corolla and Yaris jumped, with each car getting an estimate around 40 highway miles.

(the above information is sourced from wikipedia)