AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)08/03 Report--

On August 2, the official Hino Motor Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Toyota Motor Co., Ltd., released the results of a special investigation committee composed of outside lawyers into its engine emissions and fuel consumption data fraud scandal exposed on March 4 this year.

The findings show that Hino's irregularities include violations related to engine emissions, violations related to fuel consumption data, and false reports submitted by Hino when Japan's Ministry of Land, Transport and Transport investigated emissions and fuel consumption data in 2016. Among them, Hino's emission violations began at least around 2003, which was much earlier than Hino's previous announcement in 2016, nearly 20 years ago.

On the same day, Japan's Ministry of Land and Transport said that in this report, in addition to the report of March 4 this year, there was also misconduct in the application for model designation of trucks, buses, and other engines produced in the past. Japan's Ministry of Land and Transport asked Hino Motor to recall vehicles with engines that did not meet the emission standards. In this regard, Hino Motor said: "We have carefully listened to the recommendations put forward by the Special investigation Committee and will discuss the establishment of a sound governance system within the company within a period of three months, including the construction of a quality management system." improve the organization, atmosphere and other enterprise systems, strengthen management and supervision functions and related implementation systems. "

According to public data, Hino Motors, founded in 1942 and headquartered in Hino City, Tokyo, Japan, is currently the largest commercial vehicle manufacturer in Japan, with 8583 employees and total assets of 72.7 billion yen. Mainly engaged in truck and bus business of commercial products. Before 1942, Hino and Isuzu were the same company. After 1942, Hino Motor became an independent company and formally used the name Hino (Hino). It began to focus on the manufacture of commercial vehicles in 1950. In August 2001, Hino (Hino) was controlled by Toyota, and Toyota owned 50.1% of Hino (Hino). In September 2002, Toyota and Hino jointly launched Japan's first fuel cell bus, FCHV-BUS2. In October 2003, Hino and Isuzu merged the bus business and formed a new joint venture.

According to Toyota's website, Hino sold 155212 vehicles worldwide in the past 2021, of which 59935 were sold in Japan. According to the latest financial report of Hino Motors, in the first quarter of fiscal year 2022 (April 1 to June 30, 2022), Hino Motor's operating income was 4.316 billion yen, down 73.3% from the same period last year; its net profit was 723 million yen, down 88.6% from the same period last year.

In early March this year, Hino admitted to the outside world that its engine data had been falsified, when Hino said: an internal investigation found that there was a problem of engine data fraud in the factory, which has lasted for many years, affecting as many as 115000 vehicles. This figure is almost twice the annual sales of Hino in Japan, so Hino stopped the transportation of medium and heavy trucks and buses with fake engines. The announcement showed that the misconduct occurred at the Japanese factory where the engine was tested in Hino, and during the test of one of the engines, the testers directly replaced the exhaust system parts to make the test results as expected because the results were substandard. On March 29, Japan's Ministry of Transport decided to deal with the fraud of data on four engines made by Toyota's Hino Motor, revoking its production license for vehicles with "problematic engines" for the first time in Japan.

Yesterday afternoon, Hino announced at a press conference the results of an investigation into Hino's engine emissions and falsification of fuel consumption data. According to the latest news released at the press conference, the investigation committee, composed of outside lawyers, conducted an in-depth investigation into the engine, emissions and fuel consumption data fraud scandal exposed by Hino in March this year. Hino car counterfeiting began at least in 2003, nearly 20 years, much earlier than Hino Motors announced in 2016 or so. The investigation also found that Hino also submitted a false report during a previous investigation by Japan's Ministry of Land and Transport on the issue of data falsification.

As a result, some models of Toyota and Isuzu are also equipped with Hino's problematic engines, forcing the two companies to suspend production of related models. And the impact of this scandal will be further expanded. Hino shares fell nearly 10% on Aug. 2 after the disclosure.

It is not clear whether the Hino car fraud scandal will involve the Chinese market. In addition, the head of Toyota China pointed out in an interview with the Daily Economic News: "in principle, Toyota and Hino operate independently, and we also pay close attention to this matter, but the main statistics and responses are still done by Hino."

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