Toyota, Japan’s biggest automotive manufacturer, announced on Saturday that by the end of 2016 it had sold all of its shares in electric car maker Tesla.
The move marks the end of the tie-up between the two companies.
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Toyota acquired a three percent stake in the Palo Alto-based automaker for $50m in 2010.
They started to jointly develop RAV4 electric vehicles in Canada in 2011 and later sold about 2,500 units over three years.
Toyota held 1.43 percent in Tesla as of July 2016, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Toyota spokesman Ryo Sakai said:
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By GlobalDataOur development partnership with Tesla ended a while ago, and since there has not been any new developments on that front, we decided it was time to sell the remaining stake.
He added that the decision was part of move as “a part of a regular review of business alliances”.
Toyota formed its own unit to develop electric cars in November 2016 and will continue to focus on the company’s own development and marketing of electric cars.
Electric car sales are rising quickly in the US, up 74 percent in the first quarter to nearly 25,000 vehicles, according to CleanTechnica, a cleantech-
Shares of Tesla have increased by almost 60 percent this year.
It is the most valuable automaker in the US, ahead of General Motors and Ford, with a market cap of $55.8bn.
