Toyota Motor corp has confirmed that both the president and chairman of Daihatsu Motor will step down almost a year after the small-car unit said it had rigged collision safety-tests.
The scandals at the three companies triggered a rare apology of Toyota Chairman Akio Toyoda last month, with the brand facing a potential hit to its reputation from the safety certification lapses at Daihatsu, as well as separate governance issues at truck maker Hino Motors and affiliate Toyota Industries
In a statement, the world’s top-selling automaker said its chief executive officer for the Latin America and Caribbean region, Masahiro Inoue, will replace Soichiro Okudaira as Daihatsu’s president effective March 1 while Daihatsu’s chairman, Sunao Matsubayashi, will also step down and will not be replaced.
Toyota Chief Executive Koji Sato told reporters, however, that the organisational change at Daihatsu was not carried out as a punishment for the outgoing executives.
The outgoing Okudaira had worked at Toyota for nearly four decades before becoming president of Daihatsu in 2017, a year after it became a wholly owned Toyota subsidiary.
The departures are among the most drastic changes Daihatsu has made so far, as Toyota seeks to return the brand to its roots as one of Japan’s most iconic compact car makers.
In volume terms, Daihatsu accounted for 7% of Toyota’s total group sales of 11.2 million vehicles in 2023, including those of the luxury Lexus brand and Hino Motors.
