Lentz Says Privacy Concerns Behind Ford Tie-Up

YORK TOWNSHIP, MI – Toyota’s partnership with Ford on telematics is an effort to respect “the desires of our buyers and the privacy that they demand.”

So says Toyota North America CEO Jim Lentz here ahead of a groundbreaking ceremony for an expansion of the automaker’s Ann Arbor-area technical centers.

Last week, Toyota announced it was exploring doing an open-source version of Ford’s AppLink connected-car infotainment system.

“Who controls (the) data (created by using these systems)? We believe it’s the customers,” Lentz says when asked why Toyota simply would not use an Apple or Android-based connected-car system, as many of its competitors are doing.

“Not everyone in the industry may share that same belief,” he says of data-ownership concerns.

The tie-up with Ford is another element of a partnership that began in 2009 when Toyota and the Dearborn, MI-based automaker were going to develop a one-motor hybrid pickup. That collaboration is now defunct.

Outside of the world of telematics, Lentz says he would consider Google and Apple to be competitors if they moved into making automobiles. But he cautions they may not know what they’re in for.

“It’s one thing to compete in telematics, it’s another thing to compete in automobiles,” he tells media during a roundtable discussion. “You don’t see too many new entrants (in the auto industry), because it’s a very, very costly, very difficult business to be in.”

Further on the issue of tie-ups, Lentz says Toyota has no interest in pairing with FCA and that he has not personally been contacted by FCA CEO Sergio Marchionne. He doesn’t believe his bosses at Toyota headquarters in Japan have, either.

“It’s something that we would not be interested in. We have enough scale right now to do what we need to do,” he says while lauding FCA’s Jeep brand as a valuable asset in these times of low fuel prices.

Lentz, now located at Toyota’s new North American headquarters city of Plano, TX, was in Michigan for the groundbreaking for two new buildings to be built at the automaker’s campus in York Township, 50 miles (80 km) southwest of Detroit.

Some 250 employees have relocated or will relocate from Toyota’s former purchasing unit in Erlanger, KY, to a new 130,000-sq.-ft. (12,077 sq.-m) building, while 50 employees will work in a new 260,000-sq.-ft. (24,155 sq.-m) prototype development facility. The prototype-center employees are moving from two separate facilities in nearby Plymouth or Livonia, MI.

Additionally, 85 Toyota powertrain workers are moving from California to existing TTC office space.

Toyota also is building a 50,000-sq.-ft. (4,645 sq.-m) expansion to its nearby powertrain campus in Ann Arbor proper.

The two York Twp. buildings and one Ann Arbor addition represent a $126 million investment by Toyota in its Michigan R&D facilities.

The York Twp. additions should be complete by late 2016. That’s roughly the same time Toyota will open its new North American headquarters in Plano, which consolidates many of the automaker’s North American departments onto one campus in a move Lentz bills as creating “One Toyota.”

[email protected]