Toyota, Pressed To Innovate, Is Cutting Marketing Costs To Fuel Research

BEIJING (Reuters) - Toyota has begun slashing costs, starting with sales and marketing, and shifting resources into research that will help it keep up with new competitors, four people familiar with the matter said. One of the company's first moves was to cancel contracts with the China unit of its long-term communication and advertising agency, Dentsu Inc, the sources said. Chief executive Akio Toyoda and chief financial and risk officer Koji Kobayashi want to follow the example of Tesla, Google and Tencent - all of which rely heavily on cheaper, often more innovative non-traditional marketing. They say the savings should be plowed into investment in emerging technology such as autonomous vehicles. "We may be posting record profits, but we don't think we are keeping up with their pace of investments," one of the sources, a senior Toyota official, told Reuters.