As Toyota Motor Corp readies its new Lexus GS luxury car for export to the US in early 2012, the chief executive is raising the possibility that more Toyota production will move outside Japan. The strong yen, which has risen 9% in the past six months alone, is making the economics of building cars -- especially compacts -- in Japanese factories increasingly difficult. That could eventually make building luxury vehicles -- which deliver the fattest profit margins and have provided manufacturers the most leeway in terms of where they are made -- more complicated. Squeezed by currency, emboldened competitors and a changing market, Toyota is considering doing something it has long resisted out of pride: moving more of its luxury brand manufacturing offshore.
Read Article