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| Nissan was dazed by Mitsubishi's ruse, but came up with a swift riposte |
Mitsubishi is a small car manufacturer, struggling with economy of scale. It recently said it was going to concentrate on SUVs and light commercial vehicles to remain viable. Then it admitted long term falsification of fuel consumption with micro cars sold exclusively in Japan, many to Nissan. A major vehicle affected was the popular Nissan Days Roox (see above).
In a very Japanese way, Nissan responded by buying a 34% share of Mitsubishi Motors. It actually isn't a bad move. They can both benefit through greater purchasing power and in sharing both technology and platforms. Mitsubishi is strong in hybrid technology and Nissan has a full range of platforms available. The cost efficiencies will be substantial.
Seeing that Renault and Nissan are already an alliance, this combined arrangement will put it in a league approaching Toyota and VW Group for sales. It will take time for the benefits of the latest Nissan-Mitsubishi collaboration to come to fruition. Both brands will retain their uniqueness, with cost savings in areas that will not affect that necessary differentiation. It's ironic that it took a company cheating on one it supplied cars to that quickly led to a happy alliance.
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