Toyota sees sales increase to more than 10 million vehicles

Because of all the attention on electric cars and the dispute between Tesla and BYD, Japanese automaker Toyota has been somewhat overshadowed. Toyota is not exactly a fan of electric driving. It is aimed at hydrogen and hybrid electric vehicles and not fully electric vehicles. In addition, it is also hampered by increasing competition in its backyard: cheap Chinese car manufacturers. Japan is closer to China than to Europe.

However this does not seem to prevent it. On the contrary: Toyota strengthened its position as the world’s largest carmaker in the last financial year (ending March 31). Overall, the Japanese automaker, which also owns the Lexus luxury brand, sold 10.3 million vehicles, a 7.2 percent increase compared to 9.6 million vehicles in the previous fiscal year. It is the first car brand to sell more than 10 million cars a year. For the entire Toyota group (including Daihatsu and Hino), this corresponds to 11.1 million vehicles, compared to 10.6 million vehicles the previous year.

About a third of Toyota’s cars sold have an electric drive, such as a plug-in hybrid. The number of pure electric cars is very small: last fiscal year, Toyota sold only 111,000 fully electric cars. This makes Toyota look like a mirror image of Tesla and BYD, which are suffering from stagnant sales of electric vehicles. Consumers still find these vehicles too expensive or too far-fetched to drive with a severely depleted battery charge. Then they choose affordable classic cars, hybrid or not, like Toyota’s.