Comments on: Toyota May Double Stake In Fuji Heavy Industries

By: Johnster

Johnster — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 05:19:11 +0000

kph: Generally, Subarus and Toyotas appeal to very different people, and I would think Toyota would want to keep it that way. Which makes the current Impreza’s styling even more puzzling.

Subarus need better mileage for their AWD cars to take them to the next level. Toyota’s an ideal partner in that regard.

Actually, Subaru’s Forester, Outback, and Tribeca are heavily cross-shopped with Toyota’s RAV4 and Highlander. Add in Toyota’s soon-to-be-released Venza as a more direct competitor to the Outback.

As for the Impreza competing with Toyota, well, not so much.

Subarus do need better gas mileage, but they are often the only vehicles in their class that are available with manual transmissions and that does help improve their gas mileage a little bit when compared to their competitors.

By: Geotpf

Geotpf — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 22:22:42 +0000

Camrys have been built at Subaru’s Indiana plant for almost a year now. Access to this plant was one of the main reasons for the tie up in the first place.

http://pressroom.toyota.com/Releases/View?id=TYT2007042084663

By: jthorner

jthorner — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 21:09:06 +0000

Subaru’s all wheel drive system is inherently at a fuel economy disadvantage when competing with two wheel drive cars. I suspect that with ever tighter fuel economy regulations they are going to have to rethinking their marketing strategy.

For many years Subaru offered both FWD and AWD versions of their vehicles. They went all AWD (at least in the US) in order to have a coherent market niche strategy, which worked. Notice that they are still in the hunt while Isuzu is gone, Mitsubishi is nearly gone and Suzuki is reduced to marketing Daewoo products. Mazda and Nissan both needed foreign companies to come in and right the ship. Subaru remains, however, in a precarious position in the US market especially in light of their fuel economy disadvantage. Their other problem is that the small AWD market the Outback serves used to be theirs alone but now is crowded by nearly a dozen vehicles.

By: menno

menno — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 19:46:46 +0000

The Indiana plant owned by Subaru used to be co-owned by Isuzu. When Isuzu tanked and subcontracted all SUV manufacturing to GM, Subie bought the plant.

This meant the plant was vastly underutilized.

In fact, Toyota HAS already “taken advantage” of the Indiana Subie plant and either is now, or very soon will be, churning out Camry cars on one line, while the other produces Subies.

Unlike Detroit Inc, Japan Inc actually not only knows how to make a reliable car, but they can do so while making a profit – IN AMERICA.

Kudos to them.

By: tony-e30

tony-e30 — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 19:36:50 +0000

Does anyone think Toyota may have their eyes on Subaru’s “All Green, All the Time” Indiana assembly plant? Perhaps a technology harvest at a discount?

By: kph

kph — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:42:26 +0000

Generally, Subarus and Toyotas appeal to very different people, and I would think Toyota would want to keep it that way. Which makes the current Impreza’s styling even more puzzling.

Subarus need better mileage for their AWD cars to take them to the next level. Toyota’s an ideal partner in that regard.

By: Strippo

Strippo — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:21:18 +0000

Just give me a light, RWD Toburu (or better yet, Scioburu) coupe with a boxer engine and all will be forgiven.

By: quasimondo

quasimondo — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:00:52 +0000

Seeing how people howled at Toyota’s ‘influence’ in the new WRX (which was louder than the howling we heard when GM had them slap Saab badges on the old WRX), some Subie fans must be ready to commit seppuku by now.