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Lexus planning a hydrogen fuel-cell LS by 2017

Toyota's Fuel Cell System will certainly migrate to other vehicles in the carmaker's lineup, but Australian car site Motoring reports that one of the models at the head of the queue is the Lexus LS. According to its sources, the executive barge powered by hydrogen will be released by 2017 and take the top spot in the range, rolling in above the LS Hybrid. We're told that Toyota engineers will find a way to slide two hydrogen tanks into its bodywork with the same general setup as on the Mirai – one under the rear seats and another under the rear parcel shelf. The 150-kW fuel cell stack will be placed under the front seats. Motoring says the resulting sedan and its 220-kW electric motor would come in "at around 2,100 kg," which is 4,620 pounds; that's a ginormous 539 pounds less than the listed curb weight of the current LS Hybrid, and 387 pounds more than the standard LS. Assuming all goes as planned, it would have a range of roughly 238 miles, a few dozens less than the Mirai's range of about 300 miles. It would look slightly different, too, the front end getting larger intakes to cool the power unit. It wouldn't surprise us if Lexus does have a hydrogen LS planned – it would be a statement car, and the company likes making statements, even if few heed them; it has stuck with its LS 600h for the past seven years, yet of the 7,539 LS models sold through the end of November this year, only 61 of them were hybrids. The timing would be intriguing, however; by the time the LS hybrid came out, Lexus had already worked over its filet-and-potatoes models. And if the hydrogen version is going to come in above the $120,440 hybrid, well, that will be a statement indeed.

Toyota says you might have the 40-millionth Corolla ever built

The guy who bought the 50-millionth Toyota in the US got a free Camry and RAV4, but whoever in the world bought the 40-millionth Corolla in August gets a hearty "thank you" from the Japanese automaker. On sale since 1966, the Corolla is the best-selling nameplate in the world by a goodly margin (more than the Volkswagen Beetle and Ford Model T combined). So while you'd think that vehicle number 40 million would be sitting in a museum somewhere, Toyota can't even say in which country this milestone Corolla was sold, let alone to which customer.
One reason that Toyota is unsure where this Corolla was sold is the fact that the Corolla name itself is more than just the compact sedan sold in the US. On our shores alone, sales of the Matrix are lumped in with the Corolla, but around the world, numerous vehicles wear the Corolla name or share its platform. Scroll down for Toyota's press release, and it has also put together a website celebrating 47 years and 40 million sales for the Corolla... and counting.

HQ move based on study, not pitch from Gov. Perry, Toyota says

Toyota's surprising announcement on Monday that it will move its North American headquarters from Torrance, CA location to the Dallas suburb of Plano, TX is allegedly not due to any political wrangling from the state's Republican governor, Rick Perry.
Perry (above) has been up front in his aggressive pursuit of businesses and jobs for Texas, traveling to California, Missouri, Illinois and New York to tempt corporations to his state. And it's not just about the promise of much lower taxes, a Perry spokesman reminds Automotive News that the state boasts, "a workforce that is skilled and ready to do any job."
For his part, Jim Lentz, Toyota's North American CEO said Plano was chosen through an internal process, with the location helped by its proximity to the company's massive pickup factory in San Antonio rather than any campaigning from the governor.