Toyota Motor took the wraps off the latest iteration of the Prius, the hybrid vehicle that that paved the way for electric cars more than two decades ago.
The fifth generation of the car, with bigger wheels and a sportier design, offers three different hybrid powertrain options and will go on sale starting this winter, the carmaker said at an event in Tokyo on Wednesday. Pricing for the new model wasn’t disclosed, although Toyota stressed it would be "affordable for everybody.”
The world’s No. 1 automaker pioneered mass-market hybrid vehicles with the debut of the Prius in 1997, and contends that the technology still has a long way to go. It’s a bet on the longevity of the brand and technology at a time when Tesla and other upstarts have seized the narrative to say that the era of electric vehicles has already arrived, even though they still only make up about 6% of total global car sales.