Toyota City (Japan), March 30 (DPA) Toyota Motor launched an initiative to improve the quality of its vehicles after recall of millions of cars severely damaged the company’s reputation, the world’s largest carmaker said Tuesday.
“We want to newly examine all quality processes,” Toyota chief Akio Toyoda said at the first meeting of the global quality control task force at the company headquarters in Toyota City west of Tokyo.
The task force is to investigate all processes, including vehicle design, production and sales. At the same time the company plans to radically restructure processes if necessary.
“We want to win back our consumers’ trust,” said Toyoda, who chairs the quality committee, which has 50 members from around the world, including the heads of Toyota’s quality control departments from North America, Europe and China.
Regional quality control chiefs are to directly inform headquarters about customer complaints.
The committee’s work will be evaluated by four experts from outside the company, Toyoda said. First results are to be presented by June, he added.
Toyota had to recall more than eight million cars to fix problems with gas pedals and floor mats that caused unintended acceleration. Three-quarters of the affected cars had been sold in the US.
At the same time, it had to recall almost half a million of its best-selling Prius hybrid cars because of faulty brakes.
US authorities are investigating 52 deaths in connection with the technical defects, but Toyota’s responsibility has been proven in a few cases so far.
