The boss of Toyota says the company’s vehicles shouldn’t be considered boring anymore in what has proven to be a difficult year-to-date for the automaker.
“Until now, there were times when Toyota’s cars were called ‘boring’ or were said to be lacking in character,” Toyota chief executive Akio Toyoda told USA Today. “But I now feel that, in terms of driving and design, our customers have begun to favorably evaluate our cars.”
Although Toyoda believes that customers have started to view the brand’s offerings as more than “boring”, not everything has been going swimmingly. In fact, Toyota has had a surprisingly lackluster 12 months.
In the full fiscal year ending March 31, Toyota’s net income has fallen by 20.8 per cent to 1.831 trillion yen ($16.1 billion). In the same time period, operating income dropped by 30.1 per cent to $17.5 billion and revenue fell by 2.8 per cent to $242.2 billion.
Toyota has also revealed that it expects an 18 per cent fall in net income and a 2.5 per cent drop in revenue for the fiscal year ending in March 2018. It also says that fiscal-year sales will sit at around 10.25 million units.
The company’s falling income and revenue are being blamed on the stronger yen, higher research and development costs and decreasing U.S. sales.
Discussing the results, Toyoda said “It is my view that our latest financial results demonstrate Toyota’s desire to steadily and continuously advance our investment in the future, rather than place top priority on short-term profit.”
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