In recent times, Nissan needed a new lease of life by looking for a divorce from long-time partner Renault, whom they’ve been partners together for 25 years now that dates back to 1999. Yes, they are at a new low as said above & if things don’t change over the next 12-14 months then this may be the end of this well-known Japanese car company that produces the Godzilla GT-R, especially without Carlos Ghosn when he left a few years ago due to these allegations that gone against him.
There’s one car company though ready to save their day and that is Honda as looks like it’s a huge chance to start Nissan’s new chapter with them at some stage by buying the rest of Renault’s 15% stake and so would Mitsubishi Motors to form a new three-way pact together where Nissan holds some of their shares as well.
Pretty sure Mitsubishi wouldn’t want to stay with Renault when most of the stuff they do together nowadays only came from rebadged models like the Kangoo commercial van, Clio hatchback and Captur compact SUV — while Mitsubishi uses Nissan’s X-Trail platform for their flagship Outlander SUV model albeit with a completely different design shape.
First of all, Nissan can go and so can Mitsubishi as they’d be a great fit under Honda. Now at this time, it’s unlikely that Mitsubishi would want to go back to making these fantastic sports cars considering customer demand into making tons of SUVs and pick-up trucks like the Eclipse Coupe, GT3000 sports car and of course, the Lancer Evolution sedan.
You never know what could happen when the time is right that makes financial sense as saw the revival of Honda Prelude two-door compact coupe the other day to rival the Toyota 86. I mean, Mitsubishi can get the Eclipse coupe back under Honda’s watch but again, that’s wishful thinking unless they feel they like they are at a steady ground to roll back something unique to their rally roots. At the end of the day though, it’s all about what’s best for Nissan as well as the Japanese automotive industry including the people working there to design & make cars for customers to buy & use for the road.
And for Renault, they are free to pursue what’s best post-Nissan and Mitsubishi.
It would be cool if they team up with Chrysler’s raft of brands away from Peugeot & Citroen backed Stellantis like Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram to form under one alliance -and have them work together on some cool high-performance & even electric sedans, pick-up trucks, coupes and SUVs.
Not only that, the Chrysler Group can take advantage of the Alpine F1 Team by taking over Renault’s existing Viry Motorsport plant by making engines again under SRT Hellcat – as don’t think Renault would want to use the Nissan money on its own to reverse their difficult decision of not shutting down the Formula 1 engine program at Viry-Chatillon.
That way, Chrysler can cover most of the costs in order to create a top-notch works engine as it’s a shame that Renault will no longer make their own engines unfortunately by using Mercedes customer engines after next year. But again, you never know what could happen when Renault finally splits from Nissan at some stage – and who knows if Renault would want to help Dodge go back into NASCAR someday and maybe IndyCar too on top of NHRA Drag Racing as long as it makes perfect sense.