Kiichiro Toyoda

Kiichiro Toyoda (1894–1952) was a Japanese industrialist who founded Toyota Motor Corporation and led its growth from his family’s loom-making business.

Sakichi Toyoda: Sakichi Toyoda was a Japanese inventor and industrialist who founded Toyoda loom manufacturing and developed automatic looms. His father’s loom business supplied the industrial base from which Kiichiro launched automobile production.
Toyota AA: The Toyota AA was the first production passenger car built by Toyota, introduced in 1936. It was developed while Kiichiro was leading the company’s automobile effort.
Eiji Toyoda: Eiji Toyoda was a Japanese industrialist who led Toyota Motor Corporation and helped expand its global automobile business. Kiichiro’s cousin joined the company in its early years and later became one of its leading executives.
Toyota Production System: The Toyota Production System is a manufacturing approach organized around just-in-time production and jidoka, or built-in quality. Its later development carried forward production principles Kiichiro advocated.
Toyoda Automatic Loom Works: Toyoda Automatic Loom Works was a Japanese textile-machinery manufacturer founded by Sakichi Toyoda in 1926. Kiichiro developed the automobile business as a division of this family company.
Toyota G1: The Toyota G1 was a truck introduced in 1935 and Toyota’s first production vehicle. Its development and launch tested Toyota’s ability to design and manufacture vehicles.
Taiichi Ohno: Taiichi Ohno was a Japanese manufacturing engineer who developed key practices of the Toyota Production System. Ohno later translated production ideals associated with Kiichiro into a systematic manufacturing approach.
Japanese automobile industry: The Japanese automobile industry comprises vehicle manufacturers and related businesses based in Japan. Toyota’s emergence under Kiichiro helped establish a domestic automaker able to compete with foreign firms.
Toyoda Model G Automatic Loom: The Toyoda Model G was an automatic loom designed by Sakichi Toyoda with a mechanism that stopped it when a thread broke. Its sale to a British company helped finance the family’s move into automobile manufacturing.
Jidoka: Jidoka is a production principle in which machines or workers stop work when an abnormality occurs. Kiichiro’s family’s loom technology embodied the stop-on-defect principle later central to Toyota manufacturing.

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Soichiro HondaCompared with: Toyoda offers a revealing comparison with Honda as another engineer-founder of a Japanese vehicle manufacturer.