COROLLA PRODUCTION BEGINS IN CANADA

Toyota City―At a special ceremony held this morning at its new Cambridge, Ontario manufacturing facility, Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada, Inc. (TMMC), a TOYOTA MOTOR CORPORATION subsidiary, rolled its first Canadian-built Corolla off the production line. The roll-off of the blue, four-door, 1.6-liter class Corolla sedan marked the official start of commercial production at the C$400 million automotive plant.

"In less than three short years, this plant has grown from an announcement of our intentions to the latest 'jewel' in the Toyota crown," said Eiji Toyoda, chairman of Toyota Motor Corp., when addressing the 500 TMMC 'team members' attending the ceremony. "I hope that this 'jewel' continues to sparkle and at the same time, contribute to the local economy."

Toyota announced plans for the plant in December 1985, and followed this with a May 1986 groundbreaking. Plant construction, and employee hiring and training, have proceeded smoothly over the past year and a half.

At present, TMMC employs about 500 'team members' for single-shift operations. This number will increase to 1,000 when a second shift is added in the fall of 1989. At full production in 1990, TMMC is scheduled to produce 50,000 Canadian Corollas per year.

The start-up of commercial production at TMMC brings the number of North American plants manufacturing Toyota cars to three. Two U.S. plants, New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. (NUMMI) in California and Toyota Motor Manufacturing, U.S.A., Inc. in Kentucky are already in operation.