Toyota Motor Corp. (TM) announced that it will invest $2.1 million in order to upgrade its Bodine Aluminum Tennessee Inc. facility at Jackson, Tennessee. The plant manufactures transmission case and housing for the automaker.
The plant, which was opened in 2005, employs 302 workers. The investment will add 10 new workers at the plant.
Toyota will also invest $6 million for upgrading the Jackson plant’s sister facility in Troy, Missouri. Both the facilities supply components for Toyota’s plant in West Virginia.
Last year, Toyota invested $1.3 billion for building a new plant in Blue Springs, Mississippi. The plant would manufacture Corolla and employ 2,000 workers. The company also invested $46 million for opening a parts supplying plant in Fulton, Mississippi.
The Fulton plant will start manufacturing seats and door panels for Corolla from fall this year. It would employ as many as 250 people.
Recently, Toyota released its “global vision” plan and revealed that it expects to generate an operating profit of ¥1 trillion, translating into an operating margin of 5%, “as soon as possible” despite a backlash on the back of a strong yen. The projection assumed dollar and euro exchange rates of ¥85 and ¥110, respectively.
The operating profit guidance was nearly double of ¥550 billion, forecasted for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2011. Meanwhile, operating margin of 5% outlook exceeded 2.9%, expected for the same fiscal year.
However, the automaker projected global annual sales of 7.50 million vehicles, which was lower than the guidance of 7.53 million vehicles for fiscal 2011. Nevertheless, the company expects annual sales to reach 10 million vehicles by 2015 globally with green vehicles being one of its pillars of success.
Toyota can possibly achieve its projected sales by 2015 being the world’s largest automaker by volume and enhancing the quality of its vehicles. In 2010, the automaker topped General Motors Company (GM) by 30,000 units with worldwide sales of 8.42 million vehicles.
In the third quarter of fiscal 2011, the company posted a 39% fall in profit to ¥93.63 billion ($1.14 billion) or ¥29.86 (36 cents) per share from ¥153.22 billion ($1.86 billion) or ¥48.86 (59 cents) per share in the year-ago quarter. The fall in profit was attributable to lower sales in the Japan, North America and Europe as well as stronger yen.
Consolidated revenues in the quarter dipped 12% to ¥4.67 trillion ($56.74 billion) on the back of a 13% fall in global sales volume to 1.8 million units. Vehicle sales declined 21% to 507,861 units in North America, 31% to 402,476 units in Japan and 5% to 207,621 units in Europe. Meanwhile, sales rose 21% to 334,504 units in Asia and 2% to 349,219 units in Other regions.
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