First Hybrid Yaris Rolls Off Line In France
TTACers have known it for quite some while: Europeans won’t get a Prius C / Aqua compact hybrid, they will get a hybrid Yaris. Today, the first one rolled off the line at Toyota’s plant in Valenciennes, in the north of France.
The first Yaris hybrid won’t have it far, it is already on the way to a customer in the north of France. The Valenciennes plant is proud of being the first French and first European automotive manufacturing facility to produce a full hybrid vehicle for the B-segment.
Easy for them to say: Hybrids are not necessarily in high demand in diesel-obsessed Europe, something the Yaris hopes to change.
The Yaris Hybrid uses the downsized Toyota H HSD system, people learned to love in the Prius c / Aqua. It delivers (ahem) game-changing numbers: CO2 emissions of only 79 g/km, and a fuel consumption of 3.1 l/100km in the urban cycle.
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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Why would Toyota bother having both a Prius c AKA Aqua and a hybrid Yaris in different markets? What significant differences justify development of the two different cars? (Granted, they are related - but why bother?)
how much more expensive will the hybrid be compared to yaris 1.3?
This _is_ a Prius C right? Or rather, the Prius C is a Yaris hybrid? They certainly look similar enough, and I can't imagine Toyota re-did everything to for Europe
The wheelbase difference between the Yaris hybrid and Prius C / Aqua is actually 40mm (2510 mm/98.8″ for Yaris versus 2550mm/100.4" for Prius C / Aqua). The latter, by the way, is spot-on the outgoing Yaris sedan wheelbase. It's fairly evident that both share a lot under the skin, and both share Toyota's NBC (New Basic Car) platform with Scion xD and a number of other not-for-North America variants. As to why Europe doesn't get Prius C / Aqua, it's surely the still-strong yen versus the Euro and other world currencies. A hybridized Yaris built in Valenciennes, France with European content can be sold in Europe more cheaply and yet turn out more profit for Toyota than shipping over the Prius C / Aqua from Japan.