Toyota and SoftBank Group set up $20m joint venture
296 views · Published 9 October 2018 · 2:46 · Indexed 28 September 2026
Channel: AP Archive · 2018 · News & Politics
(4 Oct 2018) Japan's No. 1 automaker Toyota Motor and technology giant SoftBank Group are setting up a joint venture to create mobility services in what they called a "united Japan" effort to face global competition. The 2 billion yen (20 million US dollars) venture, Monet Technologies Corp. is meant to be running by the end of March. It will work on on-demand vehicle services, food deliveries, data analysis and hospital shuttles with onboard medical exams, the companies said Thursday in a news conference at a Tokyo hotel. The energy and telecoms company's past tie-ups have tended to be with overseas startups. But Softbank has also invested in leading car-sharing companies like Uber, Didi and Grab, and has acquired Arm, a leader in the Internet of Things, or IoT. Toyoda stressed the auto industry was changing in an era of connected cars, autonomous driving, car-sharing and electric vehicles. SoftBank Chairman Masayoshi Son said he was thrilled to be partnering with a top automaker on mobility and artificial intelligence, his company's expertise. The joint venture's services will roll out in Japan first, but a global expansion is in the works, the companies said. It's 50.25 percent owned by SoftBank, 49.75 percent by Toyota. Toyota is developing autonomous vehicles in time for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Monet plans to roll out a business featuring autonomous vehicle services by the second half of 2020, they said. Automakers around the world are forming tie-ups in the race to develop the next-generation of transportation, such as self-driving cars. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/ You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/e376b33f0e1f74aaf6c4ac2bdf6f3bbb
