Earlier this month, Toyota and BMW signed an agreement to share engines and hybrid technology to spread the cost of developing low emission vehicles. Under the new deal, BMW will supply Toyota with 1.6-liter and 2.0-liter four-cylinder diesel engines starting from 2014. At the time, many were wondering if Toyota's premium brand Lexus, which competes with BMW, would also receive diesel engines from the Bavarian firm. As it turns out, the answer is no.
''The agreement with BMW does not include any supply of BMW engines to Lexus,'' Toyota Europe representative Etienne Plas told Autonews Europe.
Asked by German business publication WirtschaftsWoche if the technology tie-up with the Toyota Group would give Lexus an advantage, BMW's development chief Klaus Draeger said that this won't happen as the diesel engines "are not planned for use in the Lexus brand".
Professor Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer from the Center for Automotive research at the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany told the publication that due to Lexus' low sales, it makes more sense for Toyota to position the brand as an "innovation leader" in Europe and to "go in the direction of plug-in hybrids and full hybrids".
Lexus' European sales in the first 11 months of the year were 24,623 while the BMW brand delivered 590,453 cars in the same period.
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