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TOKYO: Toyota Motor Corp has chosen Masahiro Inoue to restore leadership at Daihatsu Motor Co after the unit became entangled in a vehicle certification scandal.
Inoue, the CEO of Toyota Latin America, will replace Soichiro Okudaira effective March 1, the companies said in a joint statement Tuesday.
Daihatsu’s top posts would be replaced and its operations abroad would folded into Toyota’s oversight, Toyota CEO Koji Sato said Tuesday. A new leadership structure for Daihatsu will be announced in April, Inoue said.
“For Daihatsu to be reborn as the company it was meant to be, this is what we believe is necessary,” Sato told reporters.
An internal probe followed by a government raid of Daihatsu’s headquarters led to a weeks long suspension of domestic production, and a revocation of certification for several models.
The manufacturer supplies cars and other automobile parts to Toyota, Mazda Motor Corp and Subaru Corp. In 2016, the carmaker became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Toyota, which has promised to step in should Daihatsu struggle to compensate customers, suppliers and business partners.
Daihatsu said Tuesday it will remove itself from the Commercial Japan Partnership Technologies Corp, or CJPT, a strategic manufacturing alliance with Toyota and Suzuki Motor Corp.
Production of 10 models will resume Feb 26, Okudaira said Friday after submitting a report to transport minister Tetsuo Saito that outlines proposed countermeasures to prevent such conduct in the future.
These included increased staffing and production time, as well as training for managerial and executive staff in an effort to improve transparency.
In January, an internal investigation revealed that another unit, Toyota Industries Ltd, was found to have manipulated power output figures for some of its diesel engines.
Akio Toyoda, chairman of the Toyota group, said the entire organisation needs to “return to basics” to overcome these scandals.
Last week, Toyota raised its full-year guidance for the fiscal year ending in March, following a banner year boosted by record sales and strong demand for hybrid cars around the world.
