AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)01/19 Report--

On January 18, Toyota announced that it would suspend production of 11 production lines at eight factories in Japan, including the Wancho plant in Aichi Prefecture, in February, as the global supply of semiconductors remains scarce. Toyota said it expects domestic and foreign production of new cars in February to be about 150000 fewer than planned, with global production of about 700000 vehicles. Toyota expects new car production this fiscal year (until March 2022) to be lower than the original forecast of about 9 million vehicles.

Toyota production has been at a low level since August 2021. Toyota said on August 19, 2021 that a total of 27 production lines at 24 factories in Japan were suspended from August 24 to September due to a shortage of spare parts due to the spread of the new coronavirus in Southeast Asia. Global production fell to 540000 vehicles in September from 900000 originally planned. As the COVID-19 epidemic continues to spread in Southeast Asia, the supply of spare parts has been further affected, and a total of 27 production lines in 14 factories in Japan continued to stop operation in October. In November, Toyota's production plan began, with global production falling from 10-150000 to 1 million vehicles in November, and a total of six production lines at four factories in Japan stopped production. On Nov. 12, Toyota said 28 production lines at 14 plants were operating for the first time since May and planned to produce 800000 vehicles worldwide in December. On December 15, Toyota announced its production plan for January 2022 and plans to produce 800000 vehicles worldwide in January 2022. Toyota stressed that the target of 9 million vehicles in fiscal year 2021 (April 2021-March 2022) will remain unchanged, and the production shutdown will not affect the annual production target of 9 million vehicles. However, Toyota's production plans were affected again in just one month, suspending production at 11 production lines at eight factories in Japan in February, and global production is expected to be about 700000 vehicles in February, below expectations of about 9 million vehicles a year.

In addition to Toyota, Volkswagen is also affected by a shortage of chips. Recently, Arnold Antritz, chief financial officer of Volkswagen Group, said that there is no reason for the auto industry to be optimistic about the supply of chips in the short term. Mr Antritz explained that global chip inventories would continue to be largely constrained by supply problems, although there could be some signs of improvement by the end of 2022. In addition, Germany's BMW has also begun to deliver some vehicles without touch screens to consumers, while Cadillac has removed parking assistance for some models.

As far as the domestic market is concerned, no car companies have explicitly stopped production because of a shortage of spare parts, but the impact of the epidemic is also not optimistic. Affected by the current COVID-19 epidemic in Tianjin, FAW Toyota confirmed that its plant in Tianjin had suspended production, the Financial Associated Press reported on January 14. It is understood that FAW Toyota Tianjin plant mainly produces products including Wechi, Carola, Crown Lufang, as well as Asian Dragon, Asian Lion and other models.

According to the latest data from the Tianjin Health Commission, 14 new local COVID-19 cases were confirmed in Tianjin from 0 to 24:00 on January 18, 2022, all of which were quarantined personnel. As of 24:00 on January 18, a total of 326 confirmed cases and 22 local asymptomatic infections have been reported, of which 10 have been converted to confirmed cases.

On January 17, a Toyota spokesman in China responded to the media that the Tianjin plant had not yet resumed operation. "the situation is changing every day, and we are still making continuous statistical assessments, and it is not possible to estimate when production will resume." Toyota China also said that in addition to the Tianjin plant, FAW Toyota also has production lines in Changchun and Chengdu. Factory production in other places will also be adjusted according to the supply situation of the parts factory in Tianjin. We still take ensuring the safety of our employees as the bottom line, try our best to adopt a more flexible production system and inventory, and ensure supply as much as possible. "

Although the output is not ideal, the sales performance is OK. On January 12th Volkswagen announced that it sold 8.88 million new cars worldwide in 2021, down 5 per cent from 2020. So far, Toyota has not reported full-year results for 2021, but it sold 9.56 million vehicles in the first 11 months of 2021, leading Volkswagen for two consecutive years and topping global new car sales. The United States and China are the key to Toyota's victory. In the US market, Toyota, as an overseas carmaker, surpassed General Motors, a veteran Detroit carmaker for the first time, and became the top seller in the US market 21 years later. According to official figures released by the two companies, Toyota sold 2.332 million vehicles in the United States in 2021, up 10.4 percent from a year earlier, while General Motors fell 13.1 percent to 2.203 million vehicles, overtaking Toyota as the highest-selling carmaker in the United States. it is also the first overseas manufacturer to achieve this feat in nearly 120 years.

In the Chinese market, Toyota's sales in China rose 8.2 per cent year-on-year to 1.944 million vehicles in 2021, making it the only Japanese carmaker to achieve year-on-year growth, setting an all-time high, according to data released by Toyota China. However, Toyota is still inferior to Volkswagen in the Chinese market, which has always been Volkswagen's largest single market, although Volkswagen's sales fell 14% year-on-year in 2021, or even hit an eight-year low. But annual sales of 3.27 million vehicles are still much higher than Toyota.

Welcome to subscribe to the WeChat public account "Automotive Industry Focus" to get the first-hand insider information on the automotive industry and talk about things in the automotive circle. Welcome to break the news! WeChat ID autoWechat