TOYOTA, MORI BUILDING TO DELAY CONSTRUCTION OF ODAIBA COMPLEX

Toyota Motor Corp. (TSE:7203) and Mori Building Co. will postpone building a large-scale commercial complex in Tokyo's Odaiba entertainment district because of chilled investment conditions.

The two firms now have a 10-year lease on the land, which covers around 79,000 sq. meters and is home to the Palette Town commercial complex. They had planned to tear down the complex next May, return the land to its current owner, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, and then purchase it for some 80 billion yen (US$881.5 million). They had envisioned spending around 200 billion yen to construct a large-scale building with 23 above-ground floors containing offices, stores and car-testing facilities.

But with the economy souring last fall, both companies see difficulties with building new facilities at the present time. They have proposed to the metropolitan government that Palette Town's current operations be extended. The metropolitan government is likely to approve the postponement as long as there is no disruption to the establishment of a heat supply facility planned for the area.

Pushing back of construction means that shopping center VenusFort and Odaiba's symbolic Ferris wheel will likely continue operating until around 2012. During that time, Toyota and Mori are likely to overhaul their plans for their commercial complex.

(Nikkei)lm

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