NAGOYA: Toyota Motor Corp. resumed the operations of 25 vehicle production lines at 12 of its 14 plants in Japan on Wednesday morning, following a suspension caused by a system glitch.

The resumption came after the leading Japanese automaker replaced the defective system. The Motomachi plant in the city of Toyota in Aichi Prefecture, central Japan, is among the 12 plants.

The Toyota group aims to put into operation a total of 28 production lines at all of its 14 domestic plants, including Toyota Motor Kyushu Inc.’s Miyata plant in Fukuoka Prefecture, southwestern Japan, and Daihatsu Motor Co.’s Kyoto plant in Kyoto Prefecture, western Japan, by Wednesday evening.

According to informed sources, the glitch is believed to have resulted from the updating work of the system that manages ordering of parts.

Toyota and its parts suppliers use this system. Production at all Toyota plants in Japan was suspended by the late afternoon on Tuesday, as the automaker became unable to order parts due to the failure, which occurred on Monday.

A Toyota official said that a halt to auto production for a day or so will have “no effect” on the company’s plans on its annual auto production, as the automaker can make up for the suspension.

While saying that the company is still looking into the main reason behind the glitch, the official ruled out the possibility of a cyberattack.

The Toyota group operates the 14 plants in the eight prefectures of Tokyo, Iwate, Miyagi, Gifu, Aichi, Mie, Kyoto and Fukuoka.

Operations were halted on Wednesday at Hino Motors Ltd.’s Koga plant in Ibaraki Prefecture, eastern Japan, where the same order management system is used.

Last year, Toyota was forced to temporarily stop operations at all of its plants in Japan for a day following a cyberattack on a parts supplier. The suspension affected the production of around 13,000 vehicles.

Toyota has grown into the world’s largest automaker through the Toyota Production System, which thoroughly eliminates waste at production sites and minimizes parts inventories. However, the pursuit of higher production efficiency also entails the risk of a halt to vehicle production if parts procurement is disrupted.

JIJI Press