They are becoming more and more common alliances between manufacturers due to the high competitiveness within the automobile sector. The arrival of Chinese brands is forcing many to collaborate to become more competitive without having to make an excessive investment. Recently, an agreement was announced between Honda and Nissan to gain positioning in the Chinese market. Now it is Mitsubishi joins this alliance in a movement that makes quite a bit of sense.
We must not forget that Nissan owns a 34.01% stake at Mitsubishi (of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance) and which also has that Japanese origin that brings positions closer. In fact, these manufacturers would add up to sales of 8 million vehicles worldwide and could be a little closer to Toyota in its home market. The breakdown would be 4.1 million for Honda, plus 3.44 million for Nissan and 810,000 units for Mitsubishi. All against more than 16 million for Toyota together with Daihatsu, Suzuki, Subaru, Mazda and Hino Motors.
With the arrival of Chinese manufacturers, Honda, Nissan and Mitsubishi want to improve their competitiveness and promote their electric vehicles. For now there are not many details, but there is talk of an alliance that would allow them to standardize software of their cars. The joint development would be carried out by Honda and Nissan, while later their adhesion to Mitsubishi would be discussed. What is seeks maximum connectivitywith bidirectional systems to connect the vehicle with the outside world (V2I).
The key is that these developments are very expensive and that with the union the costs are shared, so they could continue to advance in the field of electrification more efficiently. The possibility of complementing their vehicle ranges is also not ruled out. For example, Honda could benefit from plug-in hybrids or Mitsubishi industrial hybrids. The fact is that these manufacturers They sold less than 200,000 electric cars together in 2023, while others such as Tesla or BYD exceeded 1.5 million of this type of car.
