By Ben Klayman

DETROIT (Reuters) – Mazda Motor Corp (OTC) Corp believes that three new sport-utility models, including the CX-50, will be introduced next year. This will enable the Japanese carmaker to boost U.S. vehicle sales by a quarter by the middle of the decade. The North American chief executives said Monday.

In an interview with Jeff Guyton after Mazda’s unveiling of the CX-50 mid-size car, Guyton stated that the U.S. company expected to achieve 330,000 sales this year. That is up from 280,000 in the previous year due to the semiconductor shortage. Through October, Mazda U.S. sales increased by 30% to nearly 293,000

Guyton expects further sales growth with the addition of two more SUVs to the CX-50 in 2023.

His statement was that “we do see an increase in CX-50, CX-70, and CX-90%.” Although they may not all mature by 2022, it is possible that the CX-50 and the CX-70 will continue to grow. However, my hope would be for us to reach the same level as 450,000 Americans in the U.S. in the middle of this decade.

Mazda plans to unveil the CX-50 next January at Huntsville’s plant. Toyota Motor (NYSE 🙂 Corp. Toyota has a 5% share in Mazda. The $2.3B plant already manufactures the Corolla Cross cross-cross vehicle. It will also have a combined annual production of 300,000.

Guyton claimed that launch was still in progress despite “moving feasts” of supply-chain restrictions like the chip shortage, increased raw material costs, and congestion at ports.

“I’m not seeing that it’s going to affect our launch cadence right now. We don’t see that,” he said. We have steady production, which starts in January and continues through spring.”

Guyton claimed that Alabama’s plant was constructed to be capable of producing electric vehicles in future. But, Guyton did not say if there were any plans for a hybrid CX-50.

Mazda announced that it will launch 13 electric cars by 2025. This includes five hybrid models and five plug-in hybrids. Guyton claimed that Mazda has not made any announcements about joint ventures with battery manufacturers.