- Carbon Neutrality For Protecting Beloved Cars
- Making Ever-Better Motorsports-Bred Cars
- Diverse Lifestyles To Be Enjoyed With Beloved Cars
The two companies will also have an exhibit at the concurrent Tokyo Outdoor Show.
Toyota Gazoo Racing (TGR) and Lexus have announced their exhibition plans for the Tokyo Auto Salon 2023, to be held at Makuhari Messe in Chiba, Japan, from January 13-15. The two will also present showcases at the concurrent Tokyo Outdoor Show at the same venue, with both presentations to be made under the shared theme, “Toyota: leaving no car lovers behind.”
In keeping with that theme, vehicles and parts will be exhibited under three banners: “Carbon neutrality for protecting beloved cars,” “Making ever-better motorsports-bred cars,” and “Diverse lifestyles to enjoy with beloved cars.”
In addition, TGR and Lexus will hold an “NFT Digital Stamp Rally” and a metaverse-based “Virtual Garage by GR/Lexus.” The latter will allow those who cannot attend the show to experience many of the vehicles at their leisure and from the comfort of their homes.
Carbon Neutrality For Protecting Beloved Cars
Toyota has often waxed lyrical about the drawbacks to betting a carbon-neutral future on electric vehicles alone, preaching that diversity of powertrain options is a better route to take in a bid to clean up the auto industry. While new vehicles with technologies like hybrid powertrains, hydrogen energy, and EVs will certainly help, “Toyota believes that simultaneously promoting the carbon neutralization also of vehicles currently in customer use is essential for the future.” To that end, both TGR and Lexus will present concept cars “that propose that customers can continue to drive forever in their beloved cars while taking on the challenge of reducing CO2 emissions.” It sounds a lot to us like synthetic fuels could be in the pipeline for the Japanese automaking conglomerate.
Fascinating stuff and the kind of initiative that is sure to endear the automaker to enthusiasts the world over. Not that Toyota is struggling in that regard at the moment – it is now one of the best-selling sports car brands in America.
Making Ever-Better Motorsports-Bred Cars
The theme of this concept is not new to us. When unveiling the spectacular GR GT3 Concept, Toyota noted that by commercializing motorsports cars rather than repurposing production cars for racing, Gazoo Racing will use feedback and technologies “refined through participation in various motorsports activities to develop both GT3 and mass-production cars.”
To ram this idea home, Toyota will unveil “a product that commemorates its WRC drivers' title win,” likely the special-edition GR Yaris Akio Toyota spoke of recently. Better still, Gazoo Racing will also “announce a product that utilizes the knowledge gained through WRC participation, with demo runs planned” for the last two days of the event. Earlier this year, Toyota GR86 chief engineer Yasunori Suezawa said that the GR86 is “basically” the last under the GR banner. If he wasn't being deceitful, that means we can expect both new products to be based on existing GR models (Supra, 86, Corolla, or Yaris).
Diverse Lifestyles To Be Enjoyed With Beloved Cars
Finally, new GR Parts and GR Heritage Parts scheduled for release this year will be previewed at the show. For the first time, Lexus and Toyota will exhibit at the Tokyo Outdoor Auto Show, with the former to promote its “Overtrail Project,” something that aims to blend the ideas of enjoying nature and the outdoor lifestyle with that of “coexisting with nature.” We suspect that this will focus on a sustainably-powered off-road-tuned SUV of sorts, likely the Lexus RX you see below.
With these three concepts, Toyota will cover enthusiast cars and motorsports, outdoor living, and reduced carbon emissions.
The NFT Stamp Rally we mentioned at the outset will encourage showgoers to scan QR codes at the booths of TGR and its supporting companies (Rays, Bride, Sparco/Sabelt, Toyota Auto Body, Daihatsu, Modellista, Tom's, and Toyota Gazoo Racing). Those who collect all the digital stamps will get a bonus stamp too.
Toyota will cover pretty much every sphere of the car community here, and it appears that these exhibitions will not be far off from reaching production. We can't wait.
Keyword: Toyota Gazoo Racing And Lexus Have Lots Planned For Tokyo Auto Salon 2023