Toyota revives Scion badge with tiny Indiana-built kei pickup for US fleets
The gist
Toyota is bringing back Scion as "Scion by Toyota," launching with the KEI-01, a 25-mph kei pickup built in Indiana.
The badge returns as a Toyota label, not a separate brand, and the truck is fleet-only at first.
How it unfolded
- Nov 2025Scion showed the SxS concept at the SEMA show, a 300-horsepower hybrid side-by-side off-roader developed by Toyota's North American engineering team.
- Nov 10, 2026Toyota announces Scion is returning to the U.S. as "Scion by Toyota," a Toyota badge rather than a separate brand, dubbed its "freedom lab."
- Nov 10, 2026The relaunch is unveiled at joint press conferences at Toyota's Ypsilanti R&D center in Michigan and in Frisco, Texas.
Key terms
- kei pickup
- A small Japanese pickup truck built to meet the keijidōsha light-vehicle size class, also called a kei truck or keitora.
- fleet customers
- Buyers that are businesses, government agencies, or other organizations owning or leasing vehicles, rather than individual families.
Source: Wikipedia