Toyota appoints John Howett as President of Toyota Motorsport

Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) and Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG) announced today the appointment of John Howett as President of TMG, effective 1 January 2003. In his new function, John Howett will manage the day-to-day operations of Toyota's motorsports subsidiary and lead the management of its 550-plus employees in Cologne, Germany Ove Andersson will assume the position of Vice-Chairman and continue to be the Team Principal of Toyota's F1 team - Panasonic Toyota Racing. Tsutomu Tomita, Managing Director of TMC, remains Chairman of TMG.

To date Ove Andersson has doubled the roles of both TMG company management and race-activity management. Under the new structure, these two distinct roles will be separated in order to further progress the Toyota F1 project.

50-year-old Briton John Howett is currently Vice-President of Toyota Motor Marketing Europe (TMME) and he has 25 years experience with Toyota. On his new appointment, John Howett commented: "The F1 project is extremely important for Toyota. It is an honour for me to take up the challenge to be the president of the company that is playing the key role in the development of this project. I am a newcomer on the F1 scene, but I have considerable experience in motorsport with Toyota Team Europe, working closely with Ove Andersson. By embracing the true "Spirit of Challenge" of our company, I believe that my passion for motorsports and my experience with Toyota will help me to contribute to the success of Toyota's F1 project."

"During Toyota's F1 debut year, I combined the race-related management at Grand Prix and the general management of TMG," said Ove Andersson. "I have now come to the conclusion that I should focus on the race activities and the negotiations with our partners and other stakeholders in the F1 world. I warmly welcome John to TMG and am sure I can count on him to manage the company in Cologne."

"I am very pleased to have someone like John Howett, as President of TMG, who knows Toyota and the Toyota Way of doing business extremely well," said Tsutomu Tomita. "While John manages the company, Ove can concentrate fully on race-related activities. This structural change definitely makes our organisation stronger and will allow the team to be even better prepared for our second season of competition in F1 - the pinnacle of motorsport."