Hiroshi Okuda

Hiroshi Okuda in 2005

Hiroshi Okuda (奥田碩 Okuda Hiroshi) (b. 1932, Mie Prefecture), chairman of the Toyota Motor Corporation since 1999. He became president of Toyota in 1995 and has worked at the corporation for 50 years. In 1998, Okuda was selected as a member of the Prime Minister's Economic Strategy Council of Japan and became chairman of the Japan Federation of Employers' Associations in 1999. He has also held the position of chairman of the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association since 2000. Okuda holds a blackbelt in Judo and graduated from Hitotsubashi University in 1955.

Okuda saw the need for hybrid cars long before the world demanded them. He greenlighted the engine technology that would bring forth the era of fuel efficiency and zero emission cars.