Toyota boss: “a car is not a car if it’s not fun”

Toyota, a hugely successful Japanese car company behind some of the world’s worthiest, occasionally boring and sporadically brilliant cars, has announced it wants to… build more fun cars.

It announced this intention in the most Toyota way possible: at a worthy, occasionally boring and sporadically interesting financial results conference. Boss Koji Sato, responding to a question about there being fewer exciting cars on the road, sounded upbeat.

“I feel entirely the same way,” Sato-san said. “A car is not a car if it’s not fun. That’s why we will never allow our cars to become commodities.” Yeah, we know too. But, consider Toyota’s recent run of form, and you’d be hard pushed to disagree. Heck, it’d manage the whole ‘fun’ thing with just the GR Yaris alone.

“We can no longer sell cars just with model updates,” he continued, “slightly better fuel efficiency or new designs. It comes down to your passion for making products that move people’s hearts.

“Of course, sports cars need to be sleek, but unless that same passion can be found in other types of cars, you won’t be able to reach customers. I’m trying to instil this kind of mindset in each of our project teams.

“That is the Toyota I want to create, and I will continue working on that this year,” he added.

Probably why the new sixth-generation RAV4 is now available in 300bhp GR Sport guise, replete with new dampers, and a new-found focus on hoonery. And don’t forget the whole ‘GR Yaris’ thing.

Sato-san – former Gazoo Racing boss – carries on the mantra laid down by his predecessor, Akio Toyoda, who back in 2017 proudly announced “no more boring cars”. We’re totally reading that as ‘build V8-engined Supra Mk6 immediately’. That sounds like… fun.