Toyota, Mazda jointly plan £1.6bn car plant, electric and connected technologies

Toyota and Mazda have joined forces with the aim of producing 300,000 vehicles a year in a £1.6bn car plant in the US, as well as pooling investment into new technologies for electric vehicles and 'connected cars'.

The Japanese car giants agreed to establish a £1.6bn joint venture plant in the US with equal funding contributions, with the goal of beginning operations in 2021 and eventually producing 300,000 vehicles a year.

Roughly 4,000 jobs will be created as part of the plan.

Donald Trump attacked Toyota earlier this year over its plans to build a new factory in Mexico, threatening to hit the Japanese carmaker with a "big border tax" if the plant was not built in the US.

The car manufacturers, which also agreed to buy a stake in each other, also announced that they will jointly develop technologies for electric vehicles that they hope will allow them "to respond quickly to regulations and market trends in each country".

Toyota and Mazda will also work together to develop technologies for "onboard multimedia infotainment systems in preparation for increased use of in-car information technologies and the increasing demand for connected technologies", with Toyota cooperating with Mazda in Toyota's vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) technologies "with the ultimate goal of creating a mobile society devoid of accidents".

Mazda said that it expects to produce cross-over models that it will newly introduce to the North American market, while Toyota said it plans to introduce the Corolla for the North American market.