Toyota Set to become worlds largest carmaker

[fidgits]

General Motors is to slash 30,000 blue-collar jobs and close five factories, all in the US -- and lose its coveted position as the world's biggest carmaker in the process.

Following years of over-capacity in the industry, and GM's well-publicised, massive pensions bill, the aim is to cut capacity by 800,000 units to 4.2 million vehicles a year by 2008. The company reckoned that its plants are running at 85 per cent capacity right now, and GM lost $4.1 billion last year in the US alone.

The upshot of GM's loss of capacity is that it's highly likely that Toyota will occupy the symbolically important position as the world's biggest carmaker by next year or 2007. It's the first time for 70 years that GM has not been number 1.

Following the announcement by GM Toyota is quickening its quest to unseat become the world’s biggest automaker with reported plans to start manufacturing up to 100,000 Toyota vehicles at a Subaru factory in Indiana.

Word of Toyota’s ramped-up production schedule comes just days after money-losing GM said it will close 12 facilities by 2008 in a move that will slash the number of vehicles it is able to build in North America by about 1 million a year.

The combined developments could help the Japanese automaker surpass GM in worldwide production, although it’s unclear if that could happen because Detroit-based GM is growing rapidly in Asia.

[Leighcm]

General Motors is to slash 30,000 blue-collar jobs and close five factories, all in the US -- and lose its coveted position as the world's biggest carmaker in the process.

Following years of over-capacity in the industry, and GM's well-publicised, massive pensions bill, the aim is to cut capacity by 800,000 units to 4.2 million vehicles a year by 2008. The company reckoned that its plants are running at 85 per cent capacity right now, and GM lost $4.1 billion last year in the US alone.

The upshot of GM's loss of capacity is that it's highly likely that Toyota will occupy the symbolically important position as the world's biggest carmaker by next year or 2007. It's the first time for 70 years that GM has not been number 1.

Following the announcement by GM Toyota is quickening its quest to unseat become the world’s biggest automaker with reported plans to start manufacturing up to 100,000 Toyota vehicles at a Subaru factory in Indiana.

Word of Toyota’s ramped-up production schedule comes just days after money-losing GM said it will close 12 facilities by 2008 in a move that will slash the number of vehicles it is able to build in North America by about 1 million a year.

The combined developments could help the Japanese automaker surpass GM in worldwide production, although it’s unclear if that could happen because Detroit-based GM is growing rapidly in Asia.

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I forget where I heard this, but someone told me at one point that the folks at Toyota were going to actually raise prices a bit just to help GM out.