Is Toyota Grand Highlander Coming? Toyota Teases New “Electrified” Three-Row SUV

Toyota announced Wednesday the addition of two more vehicles to their United States lineup. One will be badged a Toyota, while the other will be a Lexus.

Both will be manufactured at Toyota’s growing Princeton, Indiana production facility. They will join Toyota Highlander, Highlander Hybrid, Sienna Hybrid and Sequoia.

And both are teased to be “electrified” in some way.

Toyota New SUV

Both new Indiana SUVs are scheduled to be built “with the active Gen Y American Family in mind,” to quote the Toyota press release Wednesday.

Look for both the Toyota and the Lexus SUV to be all-new and with three rows of seating (up to eight passengers). To me, this is interesting because there may be a need for a vehicle somewhere between the size of a Highlander and the larger Sequoia.

And what about this “targeting the active Gen Y family” reference?

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Toyota plans for both vehicles to contain some degree of hands-free driving in certain situations. Also plan to see a state-of-the-art remote driving system where people can park and unpark their vehicles when outside their cars – all from their smartphones.

This is crazy stuff folks.

Oh, and this new Toyota SUV will feature a digital key where people can transform their smartphone into this same digital key. They can even transfer this key digitally to family members and friends as needed.

Sounds like an evolution of current Toyota Remote Connect to me. Sort of like how Toyota Safety Sense keeps evolving and is at TSS 2.5+ now.

This new SUV sounds good so far. But we still do not know what it is. Or what it will even be called. Or do we?

Toyota Grand Highlander possibility

I wrote a Torque News story a few months ago revealing that Toyota applied for the trademark name “Grand Highlander.”

What may have been mere speculation, and what may still be just that, could eventually come to fruition.

Is there a chance this announcement by Toyota of a new three-row, eight-passenger SUV could also involve the name “Grand Highlander?”

There certainly is the need for a vehicle like this. One that is smooth and quiet and comfortable just like 2021 Toyota Highlander. But one that also has the space for more third-row passenger room and greater cargo capacity.

And a hybrid at that. Or a plug-in hybrid. Or possibly an all-electric.

Time for your Toyota comments

Here is the official Toyota press release for more specifics.

It is fascinating to me that Toyota now plans on manufacturing 70% of all its cars, trucks and SUVs with some form of electrified power plant.

This could mean traditional Toyota hybrids, hydrogen fuel-cells, battery electric, or other form of electrification like plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.

What type of vehicle do you think would best fit into the Toyota lineup at this point?

Would you rather have brand new models come out, or would you rather have additions to existing models?

Maybe like a Highlander Prime. Now THAT would be cool.

Thanks for reading everyone. See you next story.

READ MORE:
- Brighter future coming for 2022 Toyota Highlander
- When you can expect 2022 Toyota 4Runner

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