Toyota and Subaru are having a baby, twins actually. Dubbed Toyobaru by the automotive press, the joint project is more officially known as the Toyota FT-86 concept. Subaru fathered the powertrain and chassis; the body appears to have been ladled directly from the Toyota gene pool. 

Buzz has it Subaru plans to release their own variant of the car at some point in 2011. Being a Sube, it will come equipped with all-wheel drive and a version of the FT-86’s naturally aspirated 2.0-liter flat-4 that puts out 250 horsepower, or 50 more than Toyota’s car. Subaru’s version will also be a bit larger than the Toyota, due to a stretched platform. Both cars will run around with a six-speed manual gearbox. 

Prices are expected to hit in the $30,000 range for the more powerful all-wheel drive Subaru, about $5,000 more than the Toyota. Edmonds Inside Line says that the price/options differences should keep the cars from directly competing with each other, and from possibly stealing sales from the Subaru Impreza WRX. 

Keep in mind that we’re still only talking about a concept car here. Regardless, this guy thinks the FT-86 could be the most attractive non-Lexus machine to pop out of Toyota in a long while. Check it out in new videos and see the pictures here: 

http://jalopnik.com/5375233/toyota-ft+86-concept-behold-the-new-ae86

Sources: 

(1) http://www.insideline.com/subaru/toyobaru-new-details-on-subarus-version-of-the-toyota-ft-86.html

Picture: http://www.popsci.com/files/imagecache/article_image_large/files/articles/toyota_FT_86_concept.jpg