Content area
Full text
Toyota Motor Corp. is no longer certain it will manufacture its Prius hybrid car at a stalled auto plant project in Tupelo, Miss.
"We have not decided what product to build there," says Steve St. Angelo, executive vice president for Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America Inc., who is in charge ofthe project.
"We haven't decided what to do with the plant or the people there," he tells Automotive News.
But St. Angelo says he continues to meet weekly with a planning team to discuss moving forward on the mothballed $1.3 billion project.
Suppliers wait
The issue has repercussions outside of St. Angelo's office in Georgetown, Ky. Several suppliers already have invested in parts plants in northern Mississippi to produce components on a just-in-time basis.
Among them:
* The beginnings of a $200 million stamping and welding plant by Toyota's partly owned supplier Toyota Auto Body Co.
* An $80 million seating plant started by Toyota Boshoku Corp.
* A $31 million Vuteq USA Inc. injection-molding plant...