TOKYO, April 5 (Kyodo) — Toyota Industries Corp. said Thursday it will build a forklift manufacturing plant in Sao Paulo, Brazil, to replace a large portion of its imports from the United States with local production and boost sales in the country's growing market.
The machinery maker will invest about 4.6 billion yen in the plant, its first manufacturing base in South America slated to start production in October 2013, it said.
Toyota Industries plans to produce about 5,000 forklift units a year at the new Brazilian plant in fiscal 2014, ending March 2015, raising its sales in the country to some 7,000 units from the current 4,000 including those imported from its U.S. factory.
With the new Brazilian plant, the time needed to deliver products after receiving orders will be reduced to around one month from three-to-five months, the company said.
The new plant will create about 120 new jobs, it added.