Toyota EPU electric ute a strong chance for Australian release

Toyota has formally pulled the covers off its EPU electric ute thought and Toyota Australia is eager so that you can add it to their lineup.

The EPU – or ‘Electrical Pick Up’ used to be provided earlier this week and has now made its bodily level to on the Japan Mobility Advise, with Toyota Australia indicating a solid appetite so that you can add a production version of the ute to their domestic lineup.

Talking to Chasing Autos on the launch, Toyota Australia vp of gross sales and marketing and marketing Sean Hanley indicated that Australia would ‘definitely keep our hand up’ for the auto and that he thinks the EV ute ‘could furthermore skedaddle into production with minimal adjustments’.

Whereas having a protracted 3350mm wheelbase, the EPU is genuinely 165mm shorter than the present Hilux double-cab.

The EPU is also about 500mm shorter than a Rivian R1T electric decide-up, with Hanley indicating there might well be a gap in the market for a smaller and maybe extra reasonable fully-electric ute.

Importantly, he acknowledged the auto could be a enormous  ‘addition’ to the native line-up – to not be at a loss for words with a possible electric substitute for the HiLux, of which Toyota fair not too long previously introduced a prototype to Australia.

Toyota acknowledged market realities which scrutinize the extensive majority of potentialities in the ute phase peaceable leaning toward diesel powertrains to fulfill their desire for long distance differ ability and high towing ability.

The EPU’s extremely-long wheelbase indicates it’s ready to build up a quite honest battery, maybe measuring round 100kWh. That battery could furthermore provide a differ of about 500km unladen, or about 250km while towing.

Hanley cited the complexities in juggling these customer calls for with the expense of electrification, noting the obligatory want for mountainous batteries and attributable to this reality mountainous weight, as well as the movement-on of expense onto potentialities.

Despite this, Hanley sees a cleave of the market which could be willing to soar ship to a automobile comparable to the EPU.

Toyota has space an interior aim of in conjunction with an ‘electrified’ variant to all of its devices by 2030. Right here’s expected to steal the fabricate of a stronger Hilux hybrid than the Forty eight-volt at ease-hybrid Hilux arriving domestically in 2024.

It’s expected the EPU could be a pragmatic electric complement to Toyota’s native ute lineup which already involves the petrol or diesel powered Hilux as the entry-level.

The differ can even soon scrutinize the addition of the upper petrol-hybrid Tundra for customer beta-attempting out forward of a closing resolution on a remarkable wider launch in 2025.

‘We steal what’s upright for our potentialities… it’s all about being a mobility solution for all’, Hanley acknowledged.

The EPU wasn’t primarily the most easy ute on level to on the motor cloak, with Toyota also revealing the IMV-O single cab ute thought. Then again, that automobile has been fundamentally dominated out as coming to Australia.