Toyota Motor has launched a new business built around a napping device called TOTONE. Takashi Kaneko, who leads development, took the stage on August 27 at an advance media day for the "Power Nap Culture Lab Osaka" demonstration event held at Grand Green Osaka in Umekita, Osaka, and spoke about the aims of the business. TOTONE is a napping device based on the premium seats of the luxury minivans Alphard and Vellfire, with most of its components repurposed from automotive parts, and it structures a 15-minute nap as 12 minutes of falling asleep and 3 minutes of waking up. The business runs with a team of 3-4 people, a fraction of the hundreds involved in vehicle development, and its production capacity is limited to 200-300 units a year. Kaneko explained that "because a new business is something new, only innovators will buy it," and said the company is deliberately holding back on both investment and staffing. When Toyota approached its dealerships about carrying the product, they refused, asking why they should sell something that is not a car, he said, and until the company can steadily sell 20 units a month, it plans to visit customers itself. At one adopter, All Nippon Airways, maintenance workers have begun taking naps before their 2 a.m. inspection and servicing. That day, Toyota unveiled for the first time its "Nap White Paper 2026," a survey of 1,038 company employees in their 20s to 50s nationwide, which found that 85.9 percent feel sleepy during work hours, while only 10.4 percent take naps regularly. The top reason cited for finding it hard to nap was "it looks like I'm slacking off," at 53.2 percent, and the top concern when taking a nap was "what those around me think," at 54.8 percent.
Toyota Motor Corp.Toyota launched a new nap-device business built around TOTONE, repurposing automotive parts into a new product line.
ANA Holdings Inc.ANA is cited as an adopter where maintenance workers nap before 2 a.m. inspections, a passing example rather than a material development.
