AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)04/08 Report--

On April 8, Japan's Toyota announced that in order to put an end to the certification test safety scandal, Toyota will be responsible for the whole process of small cars from development to certification, and then entrust Dafa to take charge of the actual development work. This change will start with future models in turn.

In addition, Toyota said in the announcement that Toyota will reform the business structure of Dafa, which will be positioned as a "mini-car-centric travel company". Emerging Market Compact, an organization that spans Toyota and Dafa, will be disbanded. Product planning functions will also be transferred to Toyota Compact Motor Company, and business and product management functions will be transferred to Toyota's business and sales departments.

According to the data, Dafa Automobile, whose full name is Daihatsu Automotive Industry Co., Ltd., headquartered in Ikeda, Osaka Prefecture, Japan, founded in 1907, is one of the most popular light mini-car manufacturers in Japan. In 1998, Toyota formally acquired Dafa Automobile Industry and acquired a 51.2% stake in Dafa. Since then, it has become a subsidiary of Toyota Motor Group, which mainly focuses on the manufacture of small cars and accounts for about 4% of Toyota's global sales.

At present, Daihatsu has four complete vehicle factories in the Japanese local market, with a cumulative annual output of more than 920000 vehicles in 2022. Dafa suspended production activities in December 2023 after admitting to violations such as falsifying safety crash test data.

On December 20, 2023, Japan's Daihatsu released a 162-page third-party investigation report. According to the investigation, in addition to the fake door accessories in April and the rod side collision test in May, 174 cases of fraud were found in 25 new test items, and 64 models and 3 engines were confirmed to be fraudulent, including those that have been discontinued. Also affected by the survey are Toyota Motor Company (hereinafter referred to as "Toyota"), Mazda Motor Company (hereinafter referred to as "Mazda") and Subaru Motor Company (hereinafter referred to as "Subaru"). According to the results of the investigation, Dafa Motor decided to suspend shipments of all Dafa developed models produced in Japan and overseas, and Toyota also decided to suspend shipments of these models. On December 21, 2023, the Ministry of Land and Transport of Japan carried out an incoming inspection on Dafa.

On January 16, Japan's Ministry of Land and Transport will revoke safety certification procedures for three Daihatsu vehicles, including Toyota TownAce, Mazda Bongo and Daihatsu Gran Max. At the same time, Saito Tetsuo, Japan's minister of land and transport, issued a rectification order to Soichiro Okudaira, president of Daihatsu Motor, requiring Daihatsu to take measures to prevent such incidents from happening again.

On January 19th, Japan's Ministry of Land and Transport said it had confirmed through inspection that Daihatsu had acted improperly on 46 models. Among the 46 models confirmed to have fraudulent practices, except for one model under development, the other 45 models have carried out technical verification such as confirming the conformance of the road transport vehicle law standards and other technical verifications. the test results confirm that five models comply with the road transport vehicle law standards, so the instructions to stop delivery are lifted for these five models. Japan's Daihatsu Industrial Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Toyota, has submitted an application to Japan's Ministry of Land and Transport for a total of 322740 vehicles of the two models, the Ministry of Land and Transport announced on January 24. On January 31, Dafa resumed production of two models.

Affected by the fraud incident, in February this year, Toyota announced the latest organizational structure of Dafa Motor Co., Ltd. Toyota once again expresses its deepest apologies to customers, suppliers, dealers, the community where the factory is located and many other stakeholders for the inconvenience and concern caused by the recent certification violations. Meanwhile, Sunao Matsubayashi, chairman of Dafa Motor, and Soichiro Okudaira, president, will resign. Among them, after the resignation of Soichiro Okudaira, the post will be replaced by Masahiro Inou, chief executive of Latin America and the Caribbean. The appointment will take effect from March 1.

Hit by illegal scandals such as data fraud, Toyota's Dafa cars may lose more than 100 billion yen ($700 million). In addition, new car sales in Japan have plummeted by 80%, and Toyota's sales in Japan have dropped by more than 30%. In February, Daihatsu sold just over 9000 vehicles in Japan, down 82 per cent from a year earlier, according to data.

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