Honda, Nissan and Mitsubishi join forces to survive

Japan’s three biggest car brands are considering an alliance to face tough competition from Chinese manufacturers, Asian media reported. Nikkei, Honda, Nissan and Mitsubishi to join forces with the aim of being on par with the supply chain of Chinese companies.

Currently, only Honda and Nissan, which are strong competitors to each other, have announced this. will work together to prevent Chinese car companies from posing a major threat than is currently assumed. Both manufacturers announced the alliance a month ago, and now Mitsubishi Motors, in which Nissan owns 34.01%, may join them. However, at the moment there are not many details on this matter, since the conversations are confidential, the aforementioned media outlet reports.

We emphasize once again that the alliance will enable Japanese companies compete in terms of scale and supply chainbecause individually, both companies lack the capacity to reach the high production volumes of manufacturers like Tesla, which makes some of its cars in China, or other Chinese electric vehicle companies.

In fact, in 2023, companies like Tesla and BYD managed to sell a total of 1.8 million and 1.57 million units of electric vehicles, respectively. Nissan and Honda Only 140,000 and 19,000 electric vehicles were sold worldwide.respectively.

Keys to the Honda, Nissan and Mitsubishi Alliance

One of the keys to this alliance between the three major Japanese manufacturers is the ability complement the corresponding lines of cars between the different companies. Mitsubishi will be responsible for producing plug-in hybrid vehicles, while Honda, which has little experience in this area, will abandon its intention to produce this type of vehicle entirely.

The Alliance will also bring with it standardization in software cars of three brands. Nikkei claims that Nissan and Honda will develop the software and that Mitsubishi will allow it to be implemented in its vehicles.

While Honda, Nissan and Mitsubishi are looking to team up to compete with Chinese manufacturers, Europe is considering raising tariffs on these companies due to their increasing market share in the territory, offering clear unfair competition to European manufacturers.