Sometimes big companies do silly things, we all know that. But why exactly Toyota America has decided to use Hatsune Miku, a virtual idol barely known outside Japan, as the promo character for a new Corolla campaign, is beyond my understanding.
I am guessing the intersection between the target group for the car and fans of Miku in North America to amount to less than 100 people, but Toyota’s marketing department may know things I don’t.
In Japan, rumor has it Hatsune Miku maker Crypton Future is planning to introduce Hatsune Miku to the American market sometime next year, maybe that’s one reason.
Here are the promo videos (Kotaku’s right, these are super awkward):