8:00AM Toyota has no interest in joining or blocking GM’s tie-up with Nisan and Renault.
In response to growing speculations that Toyota may be considering proposing to General Motors a tie-up, Toyota’s president announced Thursday that the automaker has no interest in joining or blocking the proposed tie-up between General Motors and the Renault-Nissan alliance. U.S. automaker General Motors Corp. has been in one-week talks about a possible partnership with an alliance between Renault SA of France and Nissan Motor Co.

Toyota Motor has been in partnership with the U.S. automaker for long years, as both companies operate an auto plant in Fremont, California. The 50-50 partnership, called New United Motor Manufacturing Inc., or NUMMI, was set up in 1984. Watanabe said NUMMI and other friendly ties with GM will continue unchanged, but he said he does not foresee new tie-ups involving major stakes for his company.

Joining together GM, Renault and Nissan would produce a mega-alliance, spanning the three big auto markets of the world, Europe, Japan and the U.S., with a combined annual production of 15 million vehicles.

General Motors has been battered by staggering health-care costs for its workers as it fights to maintain market share eroded by rivals, especially Japanese automakers. Toyota has been boosting global sales, and some analysts expect Toyota to acquire GM as the world''s biggest automaker in the next few years.