The news comes as Subaru seeks to minimize its risk in developing its own in-house battery electric vehicles as EV sales start cooling off. Its CEO, Atsushi Osaki says that by jointly-developing its EV SUVs and crossovers with Toyota, they will better mitigate risks.

“Through this approach of joint development, joint production and joint supply, we will ensure flexibility in the areas of development and production while mitigating risks with Toyota Motor Corp. at a time when it is difficult to clearly predict future trends,” he said. “While we have steered toward EVs, we find it important to sell internal combustion products at the same time. So, we already have plans to expand our hybrid product lineup,” said Osaki.

Despite the tapering EV sales growth, Subaru is sticking to having its worldwide volume—some 600,000 vehicles—be composed of fully-electric models by 2030. In 2023, Subaru only sold 14,000 Solterras (lead photo), its sole EV offering, worldwide.

To hit these targets, Subaru plans to roll out four full-electric crossovers by the end of 2026, including the existing Solterra. It then plans to add four more EVs by the end of 2028. The first wave of EVs will be jointly-developed and produced with Toyota. Of the three upcoming EVs, Subaru will manufacture one at its Yajima plant in Japan for joint supply to both companies. Toyota, meanwhile, will manufacture one in the U.S., also for joint supply. Toyota already makes the Solterra for Subaru at a factory in Japan.

Subaru had envisioned its own internally developed EVs for the second wave through 2028 with in-house EV production to start from 2025 in Japan.

As a bridge to that new EV lineup, Subaru will deploy a next-generation Toyota-based hybrid system to the Crosstrek, in addition to the next-generation Forester.