The following post was an April Fools prank. Our apologies to any Dodge owners who got excited about buying a quality product! :-)

Our sources have confirmed that a joint press conference will be held in the next few days announcing that the next generation Dodge Ram will be engineered, designed, and built by Toyota in San Antonio.

In an effort to stay afloat, Chrysler is sourcing the next generation Dodge Ram from Toyota.

In an effort to save cash and stay afloat, Chrysler is sourcing the next generation Dodge Ram from Toyota.

Cost-cutting pressures and the realities of the modern auto industry have hit Chrysler hard. Late last year, Chrysler announced they were selling the Dodge Viper brand. In late January, Chrysler and Fiat announced a merger. Today, Dodge officially leaves the truck business.

This move makes sense for a few reasons:

1) The merger with Fiat doesn’t bring much in the way of truck and SUV knowledge or resources to the table. The Ram is a decent selling model, but it would seem to be outside the core business strengths of the new Chrysler-Fiat (Frysler?) alliance. Outsourcing this project is a good choice.

2) The Tundra plant in San Antonio has the capacity to build 350,000 trucks per year, which is enough to build all the Rams and all the Tundras consumers will want.

3) Toyota has been looking for a way to recover their investment in the Tundra. This new arrangement offers them a quicker path to recovering their multi-million dollar investment in San Antonio.

4) This move will bolster both companies images. People might finally stop complaining about Toyota being a “foreign” automaker (despite their domestic production plants) when Toyota builds the Ram, and consumers might give quality-plagued Dodge a fair chance if one of their products is built by Toyota.

5) Dodge will save a ton of cash. No longer having to design and develop a truck will save Chrysler billions of dollars in capital which is sorely needed to keep the company afloat.

As part of the deal, Toyota will gain access to all of the Dodge Ram’s technology. We’re not sure what the benefit is here to Toyota (what can they do with it?), but who knows.

What do you think – is this good news for Tundra owners?

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