Enlarge / This Toyota factory in Indiana is getting a $1.4 billion investment so it can assemble a new three-row electric SUV for the automaker. (credit: Toyota)

US electric vehicle manufacturing got a bit of a boost today. Toyota has revealed that it is spending $1.4 billion to upgrade its factory in Princeton, Indiana, in order to assemble a new three-row electric SUV. That will add an extra 340 jobs to the factory, which currently employs more than 7,500 workers who assemble the Toyota Sienna minivan and the Toyota Highlander, Grand Highlander, and Lexus TX SUVs.

"Indiana and Toyota share a nearly 30-year partnership that has cultivated job stability and economic opportunity in Princeton and the surrounding southwest Indiana region for decades," said Governor Eric Holcomb.

"Toyota's investment in the state began with an $800 million commitment and has grown to over $8 billion. Today's incredible announcement shows yet again just how important our state’s business-friendly environment, focus on long-term success, and access to a skilled workforce is to companies seeking to expand and be profitable far into the future. Indiana proudly looks forward to continuing to be at the center of the future of mobility,” Holcomb said.

Enlarge / Artist's illustration of a pressurized lunar rover design conceived by Toyota and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. (credit: Toyota/JAXA )

On the sidelines of the state visit by the Japanese prime minister to Washington this week, US and Japanese officials have signed an agreement to cement a partnership that will pave the way for a Japanese astronaut to walk on the Moon.

The Japanese astronaut, still unnamed, will become the first international astronaut to walk on the Moon under the auspices of the NASA-led Artemis program. Astronauts from NASA's other major partners on Artemis—the European Space Agency (ESA), Canada, and the United Arab Emirates—will also get a chance to fly to the Moon, either to the planned Gateway space station in lunar orbit or on trips to the surface.

But Japan will get the first international seat on a lunar landing mission, President Biden announced Wednesday during a joint press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. Other topics on the agenda for the official visit included deepening economic, military, scientific, and educational ties between the two nations.

Enlarge / Toyota Kentucky currently churns out Camry sedans, but from next year it will also make electric vehicles. (credit: Toyota)

Toyota's factory in Georgetown, Kentucky, is getting an additional $1.3 billion investment, the automaker says. Last year it announced that the Georgetown plant would build its forthcoming three-row electric SUV; now it says it's also adding a battery pack assembly line, among other improvements.

"Today's announcement reflects our commitment to vehicle electrification and further reinvesting in our US operations," said Kerry Creech, president of Toyota Kentucky. "Generations of our team members helped prepare for this opportunity, and we will continue leading the charge into the future by remaining true to who we are as a company and putting our people first for generations to come."

Toyota has lagged behind industry rivals in its electrification plans; here in the US its sole battery EV offering is the stolid bZ4x electric crossover . The company's slow-rolling of EVs led to a change of leadership in 2023 as Akio Toyoda was replaced as CEO by former Lexus head Koji Sato.

Enlarge / Infotainment system in a 2016 Ford Escape. (credit: Getty Images | Todd Korol )

A federal appeals court rejected lawsuits that alleged five major carmakers violated a Washington state privacy law. The lawsuits centered on car infotainment systems that store text messages in a way that potentially allows the messages to be retrieved by law enforcement using specialized hardware and software. The rulings in the carmakers' favor came in cases against Ford, General Motors, Honda, Toyota, and Volkswagen.

A three-judge panel at the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit unanimously upheld US District Court rulings that dismissed the five class-action lawsuits, which were almost identical. The appeals court ruled in Ford's favor on October 27, then issued rulings upholding the dismissals of the other four cases on Tuesday this week.

We'll cover the Ford ruling here since the other decisions don't go into the same level of detail, and the arguments were similar in all five cases. The simple version is that the cases failed because the plaintiffs' data stayed in the car systems and apparently was never transmitted to law enforcement, Ford, or anyone else.

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images)

Six weeks of targeted strikes by the United Auto Workers has proved to be an effective approach. Ford, Stellantis, and General Motors have all reached tentative agreements with the UAW over the past 10 days. Now, the union wants to focus its attention on automakers like Toyota and Tesla, who have resisted unionization or opened plants in right-to-work states that are hostile to collective bargaining.

The UAW began strike action at three car factories in mid-September , the first time in the union's history that it initiated industrial action against all three of the big US automakers simultaneously.

After watching years of executive pay raise largesse, the union asked for a 36 percent pay increase spread over four years, the return of cost-of-living adjustments, and the return of defined-benefit pensions. Among other demands were an end to the two-tiered system of hiring some employees as temporary workers, which meant that people hired after 2007 could be paid half as much as someone doing the same job hired before that practice was instituted.