Japan's Mitsubishi Motors is set to join an existing alliance between Honda Motor and Nissan Motor, with the three automakers set to generate combined sales of more than 8 million vehicles, the Nikkei newspaper reported Sunday.
Nikkei reports that Mitsubishi Motors, which is 34% owned by Nissan, will work with Honda and Nissan to finalize the details of their strategic partnership, and that the three companies plan to standardize the control software installed in vehicles.
Mitsubishi declined to comment on the report, while a Nissan spokesman said only that the report was not based on anything any of the three companies had announced. A Honda spokesman also did not respond to a request for comment.
The push comes as Nissan, Japan's third-largest automaker, continues to lose market share in its two biggest markets, the United States and China, which together accounted for half of its global sales in the year to March.
On Thursday (25/7), the company cut its annual forecast after heavy discounting in the US nearly wiped out its entire first-quarter profit.
In March, Nissan and Honda said they were considering a strategic partnership to collaborate on electric vehicle component production and AI, aka artificial intelligence, in automotive software platforms.
Mitsubishi Motors has been part of a long-standing alliance with Nissan and France’s Renault, which last year agreed to restructure—with the aim of streamlining cooperation to be more pragmatic and flexible.
Separate collaborations between Nissan, Honda and Mitsubishi Motors could help Japanese automakers cut costs and strengthen themselves against fierce competition in the electric vehicle sector, which is dominated by companies such as China's BYD and the U.S.'s Tesla.
Japanese automakers were once strong in China, the world’s largest auto market, but now they are facing domestic automakers that have rapidly ramped up production and won over consumers with low-priced, software-enabled vehicles. (br/jm)
