OREANDA-NEWS. In 2020, the Japanese Toyota Motor overtook the German Volkswagen in sales and for the first time in 5 years became the most successful automaker in the world. The gap, however, is small – 9.5 million cars sold against 9.3 million. So the Japanese can easily lose the lead, and strengthen it.

The pandemic had the greatest impact on the balance of power: the closure of dealerships, the suspension of production and the total lockdown led to a drop in the European car market by a record 23.7%. Largely because of this, Volkswagen's global sales declined by 15.2% at the end of the year.

According to the company's press service, Toyota's decline was only 11.3%. This is partly due to the fact that Japan and the Asian region as a whole have been less affected by the pandemic, than Volkswagen's key markets in Europe and the United States. Plus, electric cars helped — it's share in Toyota's total sales grew from 20% to 23% over the year.

Earlier, the official representative of Lexus and Toyota in Russia recalls more than 82 thousand cars of the Lexus LX570 and Toyota LC200 models. Problems were identified in vehicles manufactured in the period from January 31, 2013 to the present.