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When Jim Lentz dropped by Automotive News last week, we reporters began the discussion by noting, rather wittily, we thought, that "There's a lot going on in the industry, you may have heard."
"Just a little bit!" quipped the CEO of Toyota North America, playing along. "Just the usual things about what the economy's going to be? How big is the industry? How many cars or trucks do I need to build? How many are four-cylinders? How many are six?"
Yep, those were the humdrum questions we'd ask Lentz or one of his predecessors in days gone by. We'd focus on the nuts and bolts of the here and now.
But as Lentz said last week: "It's a bit different these days."
Different in a deeply disorienting way. Every automaker, supplier and dealership on the planet is working with a strategic Ouija board to construe the future, to itemize and organize for the radically reconstituted industry nearly everyone agrees will form between now and roughly 2030.
Some are in a brooding state of self-scrutiny. Especially Toyota. Here is arguably the most successful auto company of the past 50 years, still doing quite well, thank you. Yet...