The History of Daihatsu Company

Daihatsu is nicknamed the big industry of small cars. This company produces mostly compact models with small-volume engines and is a filial company of Toyota, its headquarters are located in Osaka.

However Daihatsu Company is almost a century old; it started in 1907, when Osaka university professors Yoshiki and Turumi founded a company producing and selling internal combustion engines of industrial use. The company was titled Hatsudoki Seizo Co. By the way, the trademark Daihatsu appeared much later, at the beginning Hatsudoki Seizo produced engines working on natural gas, which were used in marine, mining and energetic industries. After automobiles appeared Hatsudoki considered the perspective of their production and in 1919 released 2 prototype trucks. These trucks and the results of their testing made the management of the company concentrate their attention exactly on automobiles. However they started serial automobile production only in 1930, when Hatsudoki released a tricycle model HA with 500cc engine. From contemporary perspective it could have rather been considered a motorcycle than a car.

Nevertheless HA was the first domestically produced automobile in Japan. During the following 8 years 4 more models were released, including the first in Japan compact 4-wheeled automobile that was the first messenger of further development of the company in the field of production of compact cars. The demand for Hatsudoki products increased rapidly, and so did production, so in 1938 a new manufacture was launched in Ikeda. That very year Hatsudoki released another prototype automobile, a convertible all-wheel-drive sport model equipped with a 1.2-liter motor and a 3-speed transmission. The car made up to 70 km/h.

In 1951 Hatsudoki was subjected to a series of reorganizations and was renamed to Daihatsu Kogyo Co. By 1957 the sales of Daihatsu tricycle automobiles reached very high rates so the company decided to start developing export. A new Midget tricycle automobile appeared in Japanese market and gained immense popularity.

In October 1960 a new Hi-Jet pickup equipped with a two-stroke 2-cylinder engine of 356 cc volume was released. The area of its body was less than 1.1 m2. In 1961 a 2-door Hi-Jet wagon was released; in 1962 a New-Line pickup appeared, excelling Hi-Jet in size and equipped with a water-refrigerated engine of 797cc volume. The second generation of Hi-Jet was released in 1963; in 1966 a 2-door passenger car Fellow appeared. That very 1966 Daihatsu Compagno became the first Japanese car imported to UK. Next year, in 1967, Daihatsu Kogyo signed an agreement actually putting it under Toyota Motor’s control.

In 1968 Daihatsu released Fellow SS, a mini-car with a 32-horsepower 2-carburetor engine; in compact car industry that was the first model able to compete with 31-horsepower Honda N360.