A North American version of the iQ, branded as the
Scion iQ, is slated for release in the U.S. beginning in October 2011 with the
West Coast states.
[3] The name
iQ, an
initialism of the term
intelligence quotient, recalls a competitor, the
Smart Fortwo. According to Toyota, the
i stands for "individuality" "innovation" and "intelligence", while the Q stands for "quality" and points to the iQ's "cubic" shape. It was Japanese
Car of the Year for 2008.
The iQ was designed at the
Toyota European Design and Development (Toyota ED
2) studio in
Nice,
France.
Scion iQ EV
A prototype of the
iQ EV (Scion iQ EV in the US) was exhibited at the 2011
Geneva Motor Show. The Scion iQ EV is the successor to the
FT-EV II as an
electric vehicle based on the Toyota iQ chassis.
[24][25]The US launch of the Scion iQ EV has been announced for 2012,
[26][27] and according to Toyota, for the initial roll-out the iQ EV will not be available to individual consumers, instead the carmaker decided to focus on fleet customers and
car sharing programs.
[28] The electric minicar has an estimated range of 50 miles (80 km)
.
