Toyota to Launch New Companies for Marketing and for Creating Mobility Businesses

Toyota City, Japan, September 16, 2020―Toyota Motor Corporation (Toyota), Dentsu Group Inc. (Dentsu Group), and Dentsu Inc. (Dentsu), together with Toyota subsidiary Delphys Inc. (Delphys), announced today their intention to launch a new business structure, effective from January 2021 (scheduled), for innovating marketing and creating mobility businesses.

Due to the rapid proliferation in recent years of blogs, social networking services, and other forms of social media, the main conveyors of information now include not only members of the mass media but also a diverse range of entities such as individuals and companies. In tandem, the methods for information transmission are also diversifying. In response to these changes, Toyota, centered on owned media such as the Toyota Times, has been conveying "Toyota's true self" directly to its customers and other stakeholders, as it pursues initiatives to innovate communication out of a need to provide the utmost in trustworthy information.

Furthermore, with advances in such areas as CASE (connected, autonomous, shared, electric) and Mobility as a Service (MaaS), and looking ahead to a society that gives birth to value by using information to link all things and services that support people's ways of life, Toyota has begun, through such initiatives as Woven City, the challenge of becoming a company that "mass produces" happiness.

Toyota believes that it would be difficult to achieve such kind of business-model innovation on its own. It also believes that it is necessary to have the ability to quickly and accurately grasp customers' situations and demands, and to reflect such in new businesses. Furthermore, it recognizes the need to have the power to link with many like-minded partners who feel the same, and propose together with them mobility businesses to the world.

First, based on this thinking, Toyota has decided to transform Delphys, which as a fully owned Toyota subsidiary has strengths in automotive marketing and in the domain of retail centered on automotive sales, into an entity that, going beyond the conventional framework of an advertising agency, can pursue: 1) innovation of communication toward brand-building that generates exceptional customer trust, 2) innovation of marketing that anticipates changes of the times, such as the advancement of a digital society, and 3) the challenge of executing business in a mobility society.

Furthermore, because Toyota shares its aspirations with Dentsu, which has a long track record of successful marketing and business creation both in Japan and abroad, it was decided that the two companies would implement this initiative together. Toyota believes that Dentsu, providing its knowledge and know-how related to integrated marketing communications, as well as that related to the digital domain, will drive innovation speedily forward.

Through the new business structure, without being bound by hitherto methodology, and by going beyond the domain of advertising agencies and beyond the domain of an automobile manufacturer, Toyota, together with Delphys and Dentsu, intends to consider what is best for its customers and to aim to provide them such.

Outline of launch of new business structure

In September 2020, Toyota, Dentsu Group, and Delphys concluded an agreement on a capital and business alliance that included a capital increase in Dentsu Group by Delphys through third-party allocation. Based on the agreement, the companies will launch the new business structure.

Going forward, after obtaining approval and such from the competition authorities in the countries concerned, Dentsu Group intends to invest in Delphys, with preparations being made toward the launch of the new business structure in January 2021 (scheduled).

Operating company 1

With Delphys's business as its foundation, operating company 1 will conduct: 1) innovation of communication toward brand-building that generates exceptional customer trust, 2) innovation of marketing that anticipates changes of the times, such as the advancement of a digital society, and 3) the challenge of executing business in a mobility society.

Operating company 2

Operating company 2 will engage in the creation of new mechanisms and businesses, as a research entity in the field of digital communications, through the advancement of digital transformation in the retail domain.

Holding company

The holding company will preside over operating company 1 (transformed from Delphys) and operating company 2 (newly established), and will conduct strategic decision-making related to innovation in the marketing domain.