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Toyota profits up 23% on high US sales, despite mounting legal costs

Toyota earned $9.3 billion in net income in the financial year that ends next month. The number beats earlier forecasts and marks a five-year high for the automaker, with both operating income and revenue up by 9.5 percent and 2.5 percent, respectively. Toyota saw quarterly profit enjoy a year-on-year jump of 23.4 percent, with the manufacturer earning more than $1 billion between October and December 2012. The good news comes in spite of the fact that the Japanese automaker actually endured an operating loss in North America, due in part to legal fees.
Toyota is set to pay more than $1 billion to owners who claim their vehicles decreased in value as a result of the company's recent spate of recalls. Even so, all three of the automaker's brands enjoyed a 13.5 percent sales increase in the US in the last quarter, beating the industry average. Toyota faltered in Europe, however, where it earned $99 million in operating profit last year, compared to $111 million in 2011. You can take a closer look at the company's full press release below for more information.

Toyota reveals latest autonomous tech test bed

Toyota revealed its latest autonomous technology effort Friday, a sophisticated Lexus LS 600hL prototype that showcases its plans to advance in the emerging field. The Lexus is the first developed entirely by the company's in-house Toyota Research Institute and it will focus on the car's ability to learn and see behavior on the road. Toyota is showing the car at the Prius Challenge event at Sonoma Raceway. The Lexus uses Lidar, radar, and sensors, which potentially reduce reliance on mapping. The prototype advances Toyota's last concept vehicle shown at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2013. This one is said to be more flexible and it will focus on Toyota's two autonomous tech pillars, called Guardian and Chauffeur. Guardian is meant to improve safety features, while Chauffeur moves toward full autonomy. "We believe Guardian can probably be deployed sooner and more widely than Chauffeur, providing high-level driver-assist features capable of helping mitigate collisions and save lives, sooner rather than later," Toyota Research Institute Gill Pratt said in a statement. Related Video: Green Lexus Toyota Autonomous Vehicles Luxury Sedan lexus ls

Lexus LQ flagship crossover due around 2022, so what of the LX?

When Lexus debuted the LF-1 Limitless crossover concept at the 2018 Detroit Auto Show, Lexus' U.S. general manager waited roughly six minutes to tell the world, as a way of hinting to HQ in Japan, "We have to build this vehicle." Car and Driver says the GM and his dealers will get their wish when the Lexus LQ crossover takes the top spot in the automaker's range in 2022. Underneath the "molten katana" design language that looks like an RX sent back from the future to kill an RX named Sarah Connor, we'll find the inner workings of the LS sedan, possibly including the luxury-specific TNGA-L rear- and all-wheel-drive platform. Engines could be ported straight from the LS stable for standard LQ models, meaning — for now — a 3.5-liter twin-turbo V6 with 416 horsepower and 442 pound-feet of torque, and a 3.5-liter V6 helped by two electric motors to produce a combined 354 hp. An LQ F or F Sport model could bolt up the impending twin-turbo V8 and cross the 600-hp mark. Numerous rumors over several years have clouded our view of what's planned for the pinnacle end of Lexus crossovers, though. In late 2018, whispers out of Japan claimed Lexus was working up a twin-turbo V8 with 660 horsepower for a production version of the LF-1 concept due to launch this year, with a milder V6-powered trim to make 424 hp. The V8 part came true, at least. Would an LQ cohabit with the LX as the luxury side of the flagship people-hauler coin? Or would they cohabit at all? Toyota insiders have said the next LX will turn into "an entirely different vehicle" and get far more luxurious, perhaps meaning the LX turns into the LQ. However, last October Lexus trademarked the LX 600 name, a Japanese magazine predicting a month later the next-gen LX would bow in 2021 on Toyota's truck-focused TNGA platform. And with the Toyota Land Cruiser going downmarket, jettisoning the LX would eliminate all those buyers looking for something big, luxurious, and conspicuously rugged.    Toyota has taken the time to trademark the LQ name in the U.S., Canada, France, and China, so dealer lots should clear up the mystery eventually. C/D thinks the entry-level LQ could start around $80,000, and since Lexus won't put its V8 into anything under $90,000, the top LQ trim could demand around $100,000. For comparison, the LS starts at $80,010 before destination, the LX at $86,480. Related Video: