BEIJING: Toyota Motor Corp is moving to set up a joint venture in China with a local Chinese company to produce batteries for the country’s fledgling electric-gasoline hybrid car market, a Beijing-based company spokesman said yesterday.
Takanori Yokoi, Toyota spokesman, said the Japanese carmaker is in discussions with Hunan Corun New Energy Co in the southern China province of Hunan to jointly produce nickel-metal hydride batteries for hybrid models Toyota plans to start selling in China around 2015.
Toyota previously said it was working to design key hybrid components in China to make those China-only hybrid models more affordable.
The move comes as Toyota — and other carmakers in China, both indigenous Chinese and foreign — gear up to try to kick-start sales of conventional hybrid cars in China in anticipation of changes in China’s industry policy aimed at nurturing demand for “new energy” cars to include conventional hybrids.
Until now, under the current policy, China provided generous subsidies for private purchases of all-electric battery vehicles and heavily electrified “near all-electric” plug-in hybrids, but only limited support for conventional hybrids. A growing number of industry insiders and experts believe the Chinese government would boost purchase subsidies significantly for conventional hybrids as early as this year.
Toyota’s Yokoi said the Japanese carmaker, which has bet big on petrol-electric hybrid technology since the late 1990s when it began selling the Prius hybrid, plans to launch in China two relatively affordable hybrid models around 2015. One model would be for and marketed by Toyota’s joint venture with Guangzhou Automobile Group Co, one of China’s big state-owned auto enterprises. The other would be for its joint venture with another state-owned auto maker FAW Group.
China is warming to gasoline-electric hybrid cars as it tackles an addiction to fossil fuels, and local indigenous Chinese car makers are heeding the call.
Carmakers like SAIC Motor Corp and Brilliance Auto are developing the fuel-saving technology pioneered by Toyota. Executives at BYD Co said the company plans over the next few years to stop selling petrol-fuelled cars and sell only hybrid and other new-energy cars.
Reuters
