Toyota expanding to flying cars, luxury boats

Toyota is backing a flying car company.

Cartivator has a test model it hopes to have ready by 2020. Toyota’s plan is to use the vehicle to carry the flame to the Olympic Torch at the Tokyo games.

“I always loved planes and car,” said project leader Tsubasa Nakamura. “My longtime dream was to have a personal vehicle that can fly and go many places. What I have in mind is something like the DeLorean in ‘Back to the Future’, so I’m doing this because I want to make it a reality.”

Tests have not been very successful. The vehicle rose 5 feet and crashed.

I think the direction of air current is the reason for the flight instability,” said Nakamura. “We are still working on how to fix that.”

The entire project is being redesigned.

Toyota’s Lexus division has an easier task. Lexus is building an modern luxury speedboat.

“With this yacht, we went for the wow factor, which requires no words the moment people look at it,” said Shigeki Tomoyama, Toyota’s senior managing officer.

Toyota has been building boats since 1997. In that time it has sold only 845.

Obviously the company is not going for the mass market. The Lexus yacht is designed to be even more exclusive.