Once-in-a-century changes prompt new Lexus design centre
Automotive group Lexus is to build a new business and technical centre. It will be part of the Toyota Technical Center Shimoyama in Japan’s Aichi Prefecture.
The new facility will house the development, design and planning of Lexus cars. It said the new centre would help it address what it called a once-in-a-century period of change in the automotive industry.
It said that there was a “growing social mission of carbon neutrality and compliance with the Sustainable Development Goals” on the one hand, couple with customers’ lifestyles and values changing and diversifying “at a speed previously beyond imagination”.
There will be two new buildings at the site. A new Lexus Building will have three storeys with the first floor emulating the look and feel of a pit at the Nürburgring race-track, Lexus has said. It explained that this would promote agile development.
The second floor will house an office area with an open layout for various work functions “to improve collaboration and maximise the creativity of each individual”.
For its part, the third floor will be home to an extensive design area, where designers, production engineers, aerodynamicists and other members of the company’s “experimental department” will be able to work together on new ideas.
An open environment will also foster co-creation with suppliers and business partners at the site, it said, and there will be a second building devoted to this.
Lexus aims to open the site in March 2024.
