Toyota is looking into possible power-steering problems with the Corolla subcompact, the world’s best-selling car, the car giant’s quality control executive said today.

Honda Motor Co is adding 437,000 vehicles to its 15-month old global recall for faulty airbags in the latest quality problem to hit a Japanese carmaker.

TOYOTA said yesterday it will soon announce plans to deal with braking problems in its prized Prius hybrid, amid reports it has decided to issue a recall for the latest model in Japan, a possible new embarrassment for the world’s biggest automaker.

FORMULA ONE manufacturer Renault are understood to have held a board meeting in Paris yesterday relating to their involvement in the sport.

Toyota will close a major car assembly plant for the first time after today’s announcement it is pulling out of a California factory joint venture it had previously run with General Motors.

Japan’s economy grew 3.7% at an annual pace in the second quarter, signalling exports were gradually picking up after the nation’s worst recession since the end of the Second World War, the government said today.

Japanese companies remain deeply pessimistic, but confidence is starting to improve from record lows last quarter, a key central bank survey showed today.

Japan's economy has contracted at the fastest pace since 1955 as exports plunged, companies slashed production and families spent less, it was announced today.

Toyota Motor Corp has said that incoming president Akio Toyoda, the grandson of the company's founder, will be a driver on their team in a 24-hour endurance race in Germany.

Japan’s industrial production plunged at a record pace in January, the government said today, as collapsing overseas demand forced manufacturers to keep slashing output and jobs. Household spending and retail sales also fell.

Japan’s top carmakers today reported a sharp plunge in production for January, the latest evidence of how severely the country’s mainstay industry is being hit by the global slowdown.

Japan’s economy contracted at the fastest pace in 35 years in the fourth quarter as a collapse in export demand drained life from the world’s second-biggest economy.

Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso is promising to create 1.6 million jobs over the next three years to help pull Japan out of its economic crisis.

Toyota Motor Corp is reportedly halting plans to build new factories in Thailand and Russia to cope with faltering demand amid a global recession.

Top executives of the big three American carmakers will ask the US Congress for more than $34bn (€26.1bn) in loans today as two of them battle to survive beyond the end of the month.

Wall Street closed a quiet session with a moderate advance today, with energy and other commodities companies leading the market as oil prices extended their record-breaking run.

Toyota today unveiled a violin playing robot.

Japanese stocks jumped by the most in more than four years after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S Bernanke hinted the central bank has almost finished raising US interest rates.

THE 61st Frankfurt international auto show has got under way with more than 80 models on display for the first time.

THE dollar had its biggest advance against the yen in three weeks in New York after Japan sold its currency for a second day to protect exporters.

James Rusenstein, vice-president of Toyota Motor Corp in Europe, said in a radio interview that he expects the European auto market to fall in 2003 from the previous year.

Toru Hasegawa, president of Yamaha Motor plans to develop the world's first methanol fuel cell for small motorcycles.

Local Japanese carmakers plan to step up efforts to have more of their new cars certified as low-emission vehicles by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported.

Toyota is to recall thousands of cars in Japan due to a fault.