GM 'ticked' at Toyota for taking title
Chris Vander Doelen, The Windsor Star
Published: Wednesday, January 16, 2008

General Motors of Canada is "a little ticked" at Toyota for laying claim to having North America's largest automotive plant as measured by assembled units.

It was widely reported in Canada and the U.S. this week that Toyota's assembly plant in Georgetown, Ky. surpassed GM's Oshawa plants in production in 2007. The Oshawa site has been the largest producer for eight years but it produced only 470,016 cars last year compared to Georgetown's 514,382, Toyota says.

"That's a fair story if you're just talking cars," says Stew Low, spokesman for GM Canada. But the Oshawa site remains North America's biggest producer if its truck production of over 316,000 units in 2007 is also included, he said Wednesday.

DETROIT - For eight years, General Motors Corp.' s Oshawa, Ont., assembly facility just east of Toronto has produced the most cars of any factory in North America, cranking out Chevy Impalas and Pontiacs for willing buyers. No more.

Toyota Motor Corp. says its plant in Georgetown in northern Kentucky made more cars than Oshawa last year, making it the top-producing car-assembly factory on the continent. The news was not trumpeted in a media release, but communicated quietly to senior Toyota manufacturing staff on Monday via e-mail.

It marks another milestone for Japan-based Toyota as it grows its international presence and influence. The company will also probably overtake Ford in the number of manufacturing employees it has in Canada this year, according to the Canadian Auto Workers union.

Toyota Georgetown built 514,590 cars in 2007 --most of them popular Camry sedans -- versus Oshawa's 469,907.

Even allowing for the fact the Oshawa car plant shut down for one month in December for retooling (lowering yearly output by about 40,000 units, a GM official said), Toyota still comes out on top.

Toyota unseated Ford Motor Co. as the number two automaker by sales last year in the United States, breaking Ford's 75-year lock on that spot. It is in a tight race with GM for the title of world's biggest car company by sales and output.

"Of course we celebrate any milestone," Ray Tanguay, president of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada Inc., said in an interview. "[But] volume is not that important.... We only want to grow at the pace of our quality."

Toyota boosted vehicle and engine production in North America to record levels last year, building 1.67 million vehicles and 1.57 million engines overall, a 10% increase from the previous year. Plans are underway to boost output to 2.2 million units by 2010.

The company's output has risen 39% over the past five years. It now makes 11 vehicle models on the continent.

A new Toyota plant in Woodstock, Ont., will open later this year to make RAV4 compact SUVs. Toyota's plant in Cambridge, Ont., is readying new versions of the Corolla and Matrix cars.

The Canadian dollar's rise in the past year has led to the company's Canadian factories becoming among the highest-cost in the world to operate, Mr. Tanguay said. He said Toyota is trying to cut costs several ways, including sharing distribution and other resources between its Woodstock and Cambridge locations.

"Probably now the highest point on the agenda is how to remain cost competitive," Mr. Tanguay said. "We have to be competitive versus other Toyota plants. And that's probably where I get the most pressure."