Can Toyota shake up design?

Toyota is known for a lot of things, but one of them is not inspired design. Lexus has no real design theme tying everything together and the core products from the Toyota division are not very soul-stirring. In a quote from Toyota's managing officer that could have come from late-eighties and nineties General Motors, he explains the problem, "Marketing people did the research; product planning did the packaging and then design was asked to cover it." Toyota wants to bring design to the forefront, not just an afterthought.