Toyota Pours Massive Investment in Its Alabama Plant, Creates Hundreds of Jobs

The Japanese carmaker will invest $282 million in the Alabama plant, bringing the total amount to more than $1.7 billion. The investment will help create more assembly lines that will enhance the production capacity of the factory. Drivetrain products will roll off the new assembly lines.

Toyota intends to also enhance the plant’s flexibility and show commitment to the community. The center, which covers 1.3 million square feet, produces one-third of Toyota’s engines in the United States.

The plant currently supplies four-, six-, and eight-cylinder engines to seven vehicle factories in North America. The engines that are built in Huntsville power models such as the Corolla, Corolla Cross, Highlander, RAV4, Sequoia, Sienna, Tacoma, and Tundra.

Toyota Alabama is the automaker’s largest production center in North America. There are more than 2,000 team members who assembled more than 770,000 engines last year.

The expansion will add more than 350 new jobs, which Toyota describes as high-quality positions with long-term stability. Toyota is hiring, requires no experience, and provides training. The automaker offers a pay range between $23 and $34 per hour, wage review every six months, and potential bonuses two times per year.

The positions available are in the Assembly, Machining, and Conveyance divisions. The jobs involve standing and walking at least eight hours per day, performing receptive work motions and fine hand manipulation, moderate lifting up to 20 pounds unassisted and working with small components.

Toyota currently employs more than 49,000 people in the United States. Over the years, more than 34 million cars and trucks came out of their hands at one of the brand’s nine plants in the US.

Plant number 10 will start operating by 2025 and will manufacture batteries for electric cars. Toyota offers 29 electrified options right now, which are more electrified vehicles on the road than any other carmaker.

Toyota keeps developing ICEs and calls them “game-changing”

However, the company is not too keen on rolling out EVs. Its first, the bZ4x electric crossover, was not exactly an MVP in the industry. Toyota sold 104,018 EVs worldwide in 2023, up 325 percent from the 24,000 sold in 2022. But that still is less than 1 percent of its total global sales. The brand is targeting 1.5 million EVs sold in 2025.

The automaker keeps on developing internal combustion engines, though. Earlier this week, the company’s Chief Technology Officer, Hiroki Nakajima, referred to the new 1.5-liter and 2.0-liter power units as “game-changing” in a conversation with Automotive News. Toyota is planning to integrate the engines in hybrid systems.