Lack of Chips Costing Toyota New Tundra Production

With a new version of the Toyota Tundra coming online, Toyota Motor North America has been forced to slow production at the automaker’s truck assembly plant in Texas. 

Toyota officials confirmed in an email it has cut production at its San Antonio plant to one shift instead of building vehicles on two shifts.  

“At Toyota Motor Manufacturing Texas, we have made a temporary scheduling adjustment by consolidating production from two shifts to one shift,” Toyota’s Kelly Stefanich said in an email. 

“We do continue to operate a second shift; however, the second shift focus is on training, maintenance, and optimization activity. We are evaluating this condition on a weekly basis.”

The usual suspects

Due to supply chain and COVID-related challenges, the company said it expects to continue facing shortages that will affect production at its North American plants. Officials are working to minimize the impact on production. 

“Though the situation remains fluid, in North America we are projecting a reduction of approximately 25,000 to 30,000 vehicles in February. We do not anticipate any impact to employment at this time,” she added. 

Stefanich noted in a follow-up email that during the past few months, Toyota’s had “intermittent disruptions and reductions” at all of its North American production sites due to the problems.  

The disruptions hit the San Antonio plant as TMNA is rolling out an updated version of the Toyota Tundra, the company’s full-size pickup truck. The automaker expected increase its sales volume in the red-hot truck market. 

Last month, Toyota Motor Corp., which was the world’s best-selling automaker again in 2021, confirmed it was forced to shut down 11 different assembly plants in Tokyo because COVID-19 restrictions disrupted the deliveries of semiconductors and other components made in China. The Chinese restrictions aimed at controlling the spread of COVID-19 are among the toughest in the world. 

Impact of chip shortages linger 

The shortage of computer chips continues to have a major impact on automakers. 

General Motors Co., one of the Toyota’s principal competitors in the U.S and China, reported its profits fell by more than a third in the fourth quarter as GM was forced to trim production due to shortages of semiconductors. 

Paul Jacobson, GM’s chief financial officer, also said the impact of the chip shortages could linger through the first half of 2022. 

Toyota seemed to weather the semiconductor shortages better than most automakers since it built a substantial stash of chips. However, Toyota began curtailing production last summer and last fall as the shortages continued on the heels of lockdowns and other COVID-19 restrictions in Southeast Asia, which is a major center for the processing and packaging of semiconductors.