Tokyo - Toyota Motor Corp said on Friday it planned in 2009 to be the first company in the world to sell more than 10 million vehicles, predicting growth both in emerging economies and North America.
Toyota, which is jostling with General Motors for the title of top automaker in the current year, unveiled a bullish business plan including steady sales in the United States, which has been beset by problems in its housing sector.
The pioneer of eco-friendly hybrids, Toyota has won an especially strong following in the US, where sky-high prices at the pump have boosted demand for the Japanese firm's smaller vehicles.
Toyota - including subsidiaries truckmaker Hino Motors Ltd and small car specialist Daihatsu Motor Co - anticipated sales to climb from a forecast 9.34 million this year to 9.8 million in 2008.
"We target total retail sales of 10.4 million units in 2009, including those of Hino and Daihatsu, and to sustain the base for a high level of growth," Toyota Motor president Katsuaki Watanabe told a press conference in Tokyo.
Car ownership set to soar
General Motors has been the world's best-selling automaker for seven decades and holds the all-time record of selling 9.55 million cars and trucks worldwide in 1978.
Toyota has been neck-and-neck with General Motors in sales in the current year.
The recovering Detroit giant regained its rank of world number one in the second quarter of 2007, but the Japanese company came out on top for the first half of the year.
Amid signs of economic trouble in the US, Toyota has looked to emerging economies for its future growth, expanding production in China and Russia along with North America.
"Without any doubt, car ownership will continue to grow around the world, mainly in the areas of the BRICs," Watanabe said, referring to the emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China.
"One estimate is that car ownership in the world could reach one billion in 2010," he said.
But he also expected the US economy to slow down throughout the year due to high oil prices and the problems in "subprime" housing loans to high-risk customers who are now defaulting.
"We want to withstand this economy with a sales plan that is more aggressive for the market level," Watanabe said.
Riding on pride
Analysts said Toyota's latest sales targets were bullish considering destabilising factors in the global economy.
"Especially the US market has some potentially negative elements such as the subprime loans," said Fitch Ratings' auto analyst Tatsuya Mizuno.
"The company obviously expects growth in BRICs, shifting from a sales performance that was depending on the US market," he said.
Mizuno said Toyota's new challenge was how to sustain its currently healthy financial condition. "Toyota's executives keep saying that they should not get bloated with pride," he said. "I think that is the key for the company now."
Toyota has been careful not to gloat about its success in the US, fearing a protectionist backlash of the type seen when Japanese automakers first seriously penetrated the market in the 1980s.
Toyota has sold more than one million hybrids since they were introduced a decade ago, with the US its main market.
General Motors, by contrast, has been undergoing a major restructuring plan that includes shutting several factories and cutting 30 000 jobs by 2008.
- AFP