Toyota Sales, Production Numbers Reach Record Highs As They Brush Off Chip Shortage

Toyota’s global sales in March rose to a record, as the automaker’s ability to keep producing vehicles amid a global shortage of chips puts it in a prime position to capitalize on an expected resurgence in demand for cars.

The Japanese automaker’s numbers in both sales and production as been astounding. Global sales rose 44 percent to 982,912 units, while global production rose 31.6 percent to 843,393—both numbers are record-highs.

Toyota's exhaustive monitoring of its supply chain and stockpiling of chips have allowed it to keep producing cars to meet rising demand, while its rivals have been forced to idle production due to parts shortages.

Global sales were driven mostly by China, North America, and Japan.

For FY2021 (April 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021), Toyota limited the effects of the coronavirus pandemic and softening world economy with just a 4 percent decline for the entire period selling more than 9 million automobiles. Meanwhile production numbers are down just 6.4 percent to 8.1 million vehicles.

Toyota also says its global ratio of electrified vehicle sales increased from 20 to 24 percent.

The RAV4 is the best-selling Toyota model, selling 1,031,000 units—up 2.4 percent year-on-year.

Toyota Motor Philippines saw its full FY2021 sales dip 30.3 percent to 107,418 units, while production volume dropped 28.3 percent to 37,630 units.

On the bright side, Toyota’s numbers in the Philippines have been positive thus far this year. They’ve managed to sell 33,095 units for the first three months of the year (up 28.8 percent), while production is also up 11,525 units or 26.5 percent.

This momentum, however, may be derailed by the new quarantine restrictions in place, now extended to May 14, 2021 (since LTO officers are closed, no new car sales can be done within the so-called NCR-plus bubble) as well as the DTI safeguard bond.

In comparison, in Indonesia, where the government cut the luxury tax on locally-produced vehicles (as opposed to penalizing imported ones) helped boost their sales in March by 48 percent to 26,527 units. For April, they have expanded the coverage to include larger displacement cars as well.

Source: Car Guides PH