Toyota Motor, a major sponsor of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), will not be broadcasting commercials related to the sporting event in Japan during the Olympic Games.

Toyota President Akio Toyoda will also not attend the opening ceremony on Friday.

Because of the Covid situation in Japan, Toyota has long decided not to show any spots in the “Start Your Impossible” campaign in Japan, said a spokeswoman for this newspaper.

Toyota didn't cancel something at short notice.

Patrick Welter

Correspondent for business and politics in Japan, based in Tokyo.

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For the organizers of the games, the decision of the world's largest car manufacturer is another blow after the games were postponed by a year due to the corona pandemic and are now taking place under very restrictive conditions without spectators.

Toyota's decision to forego Olympic commercials in Japan suggests that in the pandemic, the advertising value of the games in the country will fall and slide into the red.

Surveys show that the Japanese people are very skeptical about the games.

Outside Japan, in the United States, in Europe or Australia, the television spots for the "Start Your Impossible" campaign would be broadcast, the spokeswoman said. Toyota will continue to support the games and athletes with vehicles and other things. Among other things, the company provides hydrogen-powered vehicles for transport between the sports facilities. Self-driving “e-palettes” will transport athletes in the Olympic village. With the slogan “Start Your Impossible”, Toyota had deliberately sought proximity to the sporting spirit of the games in recent years. "Under the Olympic and Paralympic flags we want to show how sport can bring people together," President Toyoda was quoted on a company website.

"Partners and sponsors must have struggled to support Tokyo 2020," the organizing committee spokesman told journalists about Toyota's decision.

The sponsors would have always supported the organizers very much even during the difficult year of the pandemic.

"There are mixed public feelings about the Games," said the spokesman.

Toyota Motor is one of the exclusive circle of 14 top sponsors of the Olympic Games who have signed advertising contracts directly with the International Olympic Committee.

The company only joined the sponsorship program in 2017 in preparation for the Tokyo Games and is the exclusive partner for vehicles and mobility services until 2024.

The other two Japanese companies in the top sponsorship program are Panasonic and Bridgestone.

Toyota does not disclose how much it spends on membership in this program. The IOC puts the income from the sponsorship program in the four years up to the games in Rio at a total of 1 billion dollars. In those years only twelve companies belonged to the exclusive circle. The local organizers in Tokyo expect a total financial contribution of $ 500 million from this IOC sponsorship program.

Independent of the marketing activities of the IOC, the local organizers of the Tokyo Games have won a further 67 Japanese companies as sponsors, who will contribute a record sum of at least 3.3 billion dollars to the Games. That's at least double what local sponsors have contributed to the Olympics over the past few decades. With the waiver of spectators and the depressed mood in Japan due to the corona, it will be difficult for the local sponsors to recoup the advertising expenditure through higher sales. A survey by the American Ipsos agency in 28 countries recently showed that interest in the Olympic Games was rather restrained at 46 percent of those surveyed. In Japan, interest in the games was 32 percent according to this May and June poll.

Toyota had cautiously criticized the games in June. It is hoped that the public and Olympic athletes will have a satisfactory explanation of why the Games are being held. Other business leaders in Japan make no secret of their opinion of the Olympics. Hiroshi Mikitani, the head of the online mail order company Rakuten, compared the games to a suicide bombing. The founder of technology investor Softbank, Masayoshi Son, said in May that he was afraid of the Olympic Games because of the pandemic. Son also asked on social media whether the IOC had the power to force Japan to host the Games.