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Toyota reaches $1.2B unintended acceleration settlement in criminal probe

UPDATE: Just like that, Toyota has released an official statement confirming its $1.2-million dollar settlement with the US Attorney's Office. Our story has been updated to reflect this development and the automaker's official statement has been added below.
Toyota has reached a settlement over the criminal probe into its unintended acceleration problems, and the outcome is more expensive than first expected. The Japanese automaker has agreed to pay $1.2 billion to close the investigation among other settlement terms. The criminal inquiry focused on whether the company kept information from regulators and how it handled drivers' complaints about the problems, according to the sources.
Between 2009 and 2010, Toyota ended up recalling over 10 million vehicles worldwide over sudden acceleration fears. Fixes include modifying floor mats, gas pedals, and installing brake override software on affected models. In addition, Toyota made the latter standard on all of its new vehicles.

Race Recap: 2014 24 Hours of Le Mans defines 'endurance'

Commenting on the rush of events that rocked beginning and end of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Paul Truswell of Radio Le Mans said "the race is about the ability to endure, not just the ability of drivers to do what they do for a long time." The entire race machine, all the way down to the pit boards and radios, has to survive the stress and abuse of the entire day. This was the race to prove those words.
There were two Toyotas, two Porsches and three Audis, five of the seven led the race at some point, six of the seven ran in the top three. Toyota will be hugely disappointed that it didn't win when its car and drivers were so, so strong, but they gave Audi the kind of scare we haven't seen since the best of Peugeot's days, and Toyota did a better job of it even in the loss. Porsche blew away everyone's expectations, falling 3.5 hours short of a fairy tale ending that would have made Disney cry.
But Le Mans doesn't really do fairy tales. Well, not that fairy tale. Audi's Twitter handle during the event was #welcomechallenges. As usual, Le Mans answered for the entire field.

Toyota sees Camry share loss despite predicting increasing sales

Toyota may be set to lose share the midsize sedan market. While speaking with Automotive News, Toyota North America CEO Jim Lentz said that if his company kept pace with the current swell in the market for family four doors, Toyota would need to sell around 500,000 Camry models. "I'm not sure we can do much more than 400 [thousand] today," Lentz said.
But that doesn't mean Camry sales are shrinking - on the contrary, Lentz thinks Toyota will likely sell more Camry units in 2013 than it did in 2012, it's just that the company isn't keeping pace with segment's current explosion in popularity. Industry wide, midsized sedan sales have increased by 20 percent. "Are we going to lose [Camry] share? Probably so," Lentz said, "but we will continue to grow in raw volume."
Toyota sold 404,886 Camry units last year, and the company just revised its 2013 sales objective from 2.18 million units earlier this year to 2.2-million plus units, so while things are looking up for the brand and Camry sales may be on the rise, Toyota may not have the muscle to keep up its share in the sedan segment. Whether that's because of a production bottleneck or a predicted sales ceiling isn't clear. We've got a call in and will update this news item if/when we learn more.