The Japanese Mitsubishi Motors car manufacturer has decided to join the Alliance of Honda-Nissan companies to strengthen their market positions and compete with Chinese and American auto manufacturers.
Tesla and Chinese auto manufacturers invest considerable funds in the development of electric vehicles, creating conditions in which Japanese auto manufacturers cannot compete with them in terms of production scale and supply chains. Mitsubishi, Honda, and Nissan is aimed at creating a powerful alliance capable of resisting these challenges.
Mitsubishi and Honda-Nissan will create two main forces in the domestic market of Japan: Toyota Motor Group and the newly created Alliance Honda-Nissan-Mitsubishi. In March this year, Honda and Nissan have already announced a comprehensive cooperation agreement, but the fate of Mitsubishi Motors remained uncertain.
Now Mitsubishi Motors has signed an agreement on non -disclosure of information from Honda and Nissan and has started negotiating. Honda and Nissan, which are the second and third largest car manufacturers in Japan with global sales of 4.1 million and 3.44 million units, respectively, together with Mitsubishi Motors will have a total sales of 8.35 million cars. This will greatly strengthen their position in the market.
Toyota, the largest carmaker of Japan, has already grown with companies such as Daihatsu, Suzuki, Subaru, Mazda and Hino Motors, reaching a total sales of 16 million units. The new Honda-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance intends to standardize the car driving software and implement highly efficient technologies while reducing costs.
Honda and Nissan plan to jointly develop base software for cars and discuss it in Mitsubishi Motors. Companies will also consider complementing their car lines. For example, Honda does not produce hybrid vehicles with recharge (PHV) or pickups in Japan, while Mitsubishi Motors has strong positions in this field. This can be the basis for cooperation in the production of original equipment (OEM).
The main reason for combining the efforts of Japanese companies is a significant lag in the market for the electric car market. In 2023, Nissan and Honda sold only 140,000 and 19,000 electric vehicles, respectively, while Tesla and BYD were far from 1.8 million and 1.57 million units. In the largest car market in the world, in China, Honda and Nissan are forced to change their strategies through competition with low -cost electric vehicles of local production.
