Six Quick Questions - John Conomos, Toyota

1. What is the biggest challenge facing the Australian motor industry today?

"I think it is the challenge of meeting the growth expectation of locally-produced cars for the domestic market, gaining an increasing share against the rising imports.

"Almost 70 per cent of new vehicles sold in Australia are now imported and it is growing. But we need a strong domestic base ffor our locally-produced cars."

2. Toyota builds the Camry here and will add the Aurion later in the year, but isn't your company also Australia's largest importer?

"Yes we are, by far. But we are simply taking advantage of the rules to ensure we maintain number one in Australia in the face of vigorous competition from all directions. 'We also want to maintain growth in locally produced cars."

3. In that case, how important is the upcoming V6 Aurion and 2006 overall for Toyota?

"It is easily the most significant car yet for Toyota in this country. And the biggest year in our history.

"Not only are we introducing a range of new imports this year, including the Yaris sedan we have just displayed, but for the first time our company will introduce two locally-produced cars in the one year. They are the four-cylinder Camry, of course, and the new Aurion

4. Are these cars the ones that will see Toyota accepted as a genuine Australian carmaker alongside Holden and Ford?

"I think it's a huge step towards that ultimate goal of being recognised as a legitimate supplier of large cars in Australia. The Aurion supplies us with the opporunity.

"It is credibility in the Australian market. We are not yet recoginised because of our inability to supply a large six, where the Commodore and Falcon are icons in this market."

5. How do you see sales going in 2006?

"We don't see the market reaching one million this year. It's possible, but we're not predicting it this year.

Toyota's position is to maintain an overall market share of around 21 per cent. So if you do the numbers, we believe we will sell slightly more vehicles this year than last year, at around 205,000 to 210,000. The plan for our factory at Altona in Melbourne will be to go to 140,000 cars. We're presently around 110,000.

This is the first step towards the new target with Camry and Aurion. We haven't finalised the numbers, but by the end of the first full year with the two cars - including domestic sales and exports - we plan to be at 140,000."

6. What about staying number one in Australia and future growth, including exports?

"The plan is to move the Australian vehicle sales number for Toyota towards 250,000 vehicles for the next three or four years. If that delivers number one that's fine, but it is an outcome provided consumers accept our products.

"If we are skilful enough to reach that target then it will deliver number one, and for some time.

"The export number is a minimum of 80,000 in the first year of the new models. But we don't have a breakdown on the split between Camry and Aurion yet."