> larger hurdle than scaling things after everything is in production

The relevant data points we have on this are from Tesla. Elon has been beating the "scaling production is the hardest thing" drum. His callouts around the cost of design vs manufacturing are quite interesting.

Now Toyota has been in the at-scale manufacturing game a long time, so perhaps they're just better at this. Either way battery capacity will hold them back for a decade.

The investments we're seeing in batteries (LG, Philips, Tesla, VW) are 10x+ what Toyota is doing. I don't see how this results in Toyota able to ship cars in volume as the transition to electric accelerates.