Toyota Motor Corporation unveiled the futuristic concept car that imagine a giant smartphone to demonstrate how Japan’s top automaker is trying to take the lead in technology at the upcoming Tokyo auto show opened to the public this weekend.
Toyota Motor Corporation is showing an electric vehicle prepared for launch next year, and also a tiny version of the hit Prius gas-electric hybrid. The experimental electric vehicle Fun Vii, which the president Akido Toyoda called it as “a smartphone on four wheels” was presented at the Monday’s preview as what Toyota will display at the show. Is fun to say this electric vehicle works like a personal computer and alows drivers to connect with dealers and others with a tap of a touch panel door. “A car must appeal to our emotions,” Toyoda said, and he also added that Fun Vii electric vehicle was an example of what might be in the works in “20XX,” giving no dates and telling no price yet.
The Tokyo show has been scaled back in recent years as U.S. and European automakers increasingly look to China and other places where growth potential is greater so this is why the US automaker is not take part in the show.
Toyota’s electric vehicle FT-EV III, still a concept or test model is designed for short trips such as grocery shopping and work commutes, running 105 kilometers (65 miles) on one full charge.
The new small hybrid vehicle will be named Aqua in Japan, where it goes on sale next month. Overseas dates are undecided and it will be sold as a Prius. Toyota took another hit by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami being forced to cut back production. The forecast of demand for new passenger cars in Japan this year has been cut by 0.2 million vehicles by the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association.
The auto analyst for IHS Automotive in Tokyo, Mr. Toru Hatano, believes that fuel efficient hybrid models will be popular with Japanese consumers. “The biggest obstacle has to do with costs, and you need to boost vehicle numbers if you hope to bring down costs” he said. “Toyota has more hybrid vehicles on the market than do rivals, and that gives Toyota an advantage.”
Toyota is also premiering a fuel-cell concept vehicle, FCV-R, at the show and has also sold more than 3.4 million hybrid vehicles worldwide so far. Honda Motor Co., which has also been aggressive with hybrid technology, has sold 770,000 hybrid vehicles worldwide.
The struggle is tight and it moves towards the place of electric or hybrid vehicles.
