CHANGSHU, China (Kyodo) -- Toyota Motor Corp. held a groundbreaking ceremony Saturday for a new research and development center in eastern China to prepare for the manufacture of gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles and electric cars in the country.
With an investment of $689 million, Toyota will build a facility with a 5.2-kilometer test circuit on a 2,340,000 square-meter plot in Jiangsu Province. Operations will start in 2013, it said.
The carmaker will also manufacture key components for gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles in China, President Akio Toyoda said during the ceremony.
"We will start manufacturing in China vehicles with hybrid units made in China around 2015," he said.
The center will develop technologies for plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles. It will also study ways to adjust engines for conventional gasoline cars for the Chinese market and quality control for such vehicles.
It will also come up with ways to produce key components in China and cut costs to boost global competitiveness, working in cooperation with local firms with which Toyota jointly produces vehicles in the Chinese market, the carmaker said.