Column: GM and Toyota flip the script

Just when you think you have them all figured out, they find a way to surprise you.

Toyota and General Motors, the two top-selling automakers in the U.S., each has its own ideas about electrification. The Detroit stalwart aims to field an all-electric vehicle lineup by 2035 while its Japanese rival takes a more gradual approach with a mix of across-the-board hybridization and a handful of EVs in the near term acting as a bridge to an expanded EV fleet at some point down the road.

However, recent events deviate from those narratives, which we cover in this week’s issue of Automotive News.

Toyota Motor Corp. has defended itself against considerable criticism from investors, environmental activists and EV enthusiasts over the perception that the world’s largest automaker is lagging behind the rest of the industry, even after it pledged in late 2021 to sell 3.5 million EVs annually across the globe by 2030.

With that criticism as a backdrop, Asia Editor Hans Greimel is reporting on new plans that show that Toyota is positioning itself to make a big leap forward — if not ahead. Those plans include a new Lexus EV arriving in 2026 and a new vehicle platform that promises cutting-edge breakthroughs. But the show-stopping headline is a wave of new battery technology that could possibly deliver 900-plus miles of range. (For more details, click here.) And the automaker is getting a big boost from its home country: The Japanese government is handing Toyota about $854 million to support domestic lithium ion battery production, according to a Reuters report.

Meanwhile, GM has its eyes on EVs, but the gasoline-burning pickups and SUVs that power its profits aren’t going away anytime soon, reports Lindsay VanHulle. A slew of new investments assures that. The automaker is committing more than $2 billion toward building next-generation full-size light trucks in Michigan, Texas, Indiana and Ontario.

Makes sense. The Detroit 3’s pickups remain the nation’s top-selling vehicles, and their platform-mate SUVs are quite lucrative. too. Businesses and everyday drivers need — or just plain want — the capability that their big petrol-powered trucks provide. For now, EVs and combustion vehicles are not an either-or proposition for GM.

Another layer to this story: GM can go into potentially contentious negotiations with its U.S. and Canadian labor unions this summer with assurances of job security for workers concerned that EVs will mean the end of jobs.

The plots thicken.