Toyota Motor is exploring the development and production of orbital rockets, Chairman Akio Toyoda said Monday.
"We are exploring rockets too, because the future of mobility shouldn't be limited to just earth or just one car company, for that matter," Toyoda said during a press conference for CES.The automaker, through its"Woven by Toyota" mobility company, is investing 7 billion Japanese yen into Interstellar Technologies Inc., a Japanese private spaceflight company developing launch vehicles for satellites.>Sign up for NBC DFW's News Headlines newsletter.
Founded in 2013, Interstellar Technologies has performed seven launches of its small suborbital MOMO rockets, which reached space for the first time in 2019. The startup has yet to deploy a satellite in orbit, with plans to develop the larger ZERO and DECA line of rockets for delivering spacecraft.Toyota said the company expects to leverage its experience with the mass production of vehicles for the production of rockets with Interstellar Technologies.