Why Scion Picked Mazda to Build the iA
It didn’t take long to pick up on the fact that Toyota’s new subcompact sedan, the Scion iA, was a platform twin to the redesigned Mazda2. Toyota confirmed as much ahead of the 2015 New York International Auto Show, with both cars hailing from Mazda’s new factory in Mexico. But why would Toyota, the king of small cars, team with Mazda on a new subcompact?
Related: Toyota and Mazda Styling Clash in Scion’s New iA Sedan
Doug Murtha, Scion’s group vice president, explained.
“You’re seeing industrywide a lot of manufacturers enter into partnerships,” Murtha told reporters near Cars.com’s Chicago offices on April 15. “Mazda’s just another project in that line.”
Toyota has forged partnerships with carmakers from Tesla to Subaru. The iA has been a few years in the making, given Toyota announced its collaboration with Mazda in November 2012.
“Mazda had not independently ever had a plant outside Japan,” Murtha said. “They were going to build a product that was a hole in our lineup.”
Every Scion showroom is part of a Toyota dealership, and the parent brand already has a budget-priced car in the Yaris. Still, the Yaris is a hatchback.
“We do not have an entry-level subcompact sedan,” he said. Mazda won’t technically overlap, as it plans to offer only the Mazda2 hatchback — not the sedan — in America.
