Toyota Motor Corporation released a statement recently regarding the temporary suspension of operations of its plants in Japan. Due to a “malfunction in the production order system” last Tuesday, August 29, 2023, some domestic plants stopped operations dyring the first shift, and by the evening shift 28 production lines in all 14 plants were halted.
By yesterday all plants were expected to be back at operating capacity. Toyota said it will continue investigating the cause of this disruption, and believes it was not caused by a cyberattack.
As far as our market goes, majority of our Toyota supply comes from Thailand or Indonesia. Among the models we source from Japan are the Hiace, the Land Cruiser, the Alphard, the RAV4, and most—if not all—Lexus models. That may seem like a lot of models, but these are relatively low volume (for Toyota, especially) units, but with high price tags.
According to sources, a production halt as short as this one is usually not noticeable, and can typically be compensated for with overtime. Besides, with such high demand for Toyota’s premier products here, coupled with supply chain issues last year, the market has gotten used to wait lists.
This temporary disruption is bad timing, as Toyota Motor Philippines recently said stock of most models has begun to normalize. But if any company can pivot quickly, it’s the brand that has made the automotive production line a paragon of efficiency.
