Toyota witnessed significantly increased sales in December 2012.

In the last month of the year 2012, Toyota saw increasing sales of 194,143 vehicles across the country, according to Toyota Motors Sales, U.S.A. That indicates a 13.2 percent hike over December 2011 sales. The company sold a total number of 2.1 million vehicles in 2012, which is a 27 percent improvement over the previous year.

According to Finchannel.com, Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A. added, "With sales nearly doubling the increase of a healthy industry, Toyota had a breakout year in 2012," said Jim Lentz, president and chief executive officer of the Toyota.  

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"Last year, we introduced 19 new or updated models, which accounted for about 40 percent of our sales.  As we move into 2013 and the market sees continued growth, we expect to outperform the industry once again with another nine product launches on the horizon." He added.

Moreover, Toyota on Friday released a short teaser trailer for semi-driverless car technology of its own, where the vehicle is completely autonomous and controls itself.  Toyota's technology is intended to boost safety when there is a real human at the wheel by detecting obstacles or alerting the driver if he is falling asleep.

According to Gizmodo, U.K., the luxury arm of Toyota, Lexus, will be there showing off a LS 600h kitted out with radar and cameras to literally drive itself around, similar to what Google's been doing.

While Google is using Toyota Pirius as its base for its own autonomous cars, Toyota is on its own. So it will be interesting to see how they compare.