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'Zero' chance of Renault taking over Nissan, Mitsubishi, says Ghosn

TOKYO — Renault SA absorbing Nissan Motor Co. and Mitsubishi Motors Corp is not an option as the carmakers look to strengthen their partnership while retaining their autonomy, alliance chairman Carlos Ghosn said on Friday. "Anybody who will ask Nissan and Mitsubishi to become wholly owned subsidiaries of Renault has zero chance of getting a result," Ghosn told shareholders of Mitsubishi Motors at a meeting. He also serves as chief executive of France's Renault. The alliance was the world's top-selling passenger vehicle maker in 2017, but as the global auto industry consolidates, it is looking to strengthen its position before the 64-year-old Ghosn, its main architect, retires in the coming years after overseeing the partnership for nearly 20 years. We reported in March that the carmakers were discussing a deeper tie-up, which could see the French government, a major shareholder in Renault, give up influence at Renault and the French carmaker relinquish control over Nissan. The three automakers have a unique partnership designed to leverage their combined scale to save on costs including R&D, parts procurement and production to better compete with rivals Volkswagen AG and Toyota Motor Corp. They are also interlinked by their shareholding structure. Renault holds 43.4 percent of shares in Nissan, while Nissan owns 15 percent of Renault, with no voting rights in a partnership that began in 1999. Mitsubishi Motors joined the alliance in 2016 after Nissan took a 34 percent controlling stake in the smaller automaker. Nissan CEO Hiroto Saikawa has said the alliance is not discussing a "full merger." Ghosn said that while the focus of the alliance was to sell more cars and increase profitability by reducing unnecessary duplication of processes, he wanted each of the three automakers to maintain their independence, which differentiated the group from Toyota and Volkswagen. "We need to work together ... to find a system by which what we have today, which is working very well, can continue in the future no matter who is leading the alliance," he said. "We need to prove that this is sustainable five years down the road, 10 years down the road, 15 years down the road." In a Figaro interview published last week, Ghosn was upbeat about the prospect of securing a new deal for the alliance despite its extreme political sensitivity in France and Japan, saying a plan would need to be announced "well before" the end of his four-year term at the helm of Renault in 2022.

Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution recalled over clutch woes

Mitsubishi will be recalling over 10,000 Lancer Evolutions built between December 12, 2007 and March 5, 2013, covering model years 2008 to 2013. The recall only affects cars with manual transmissions, though, so if you opted for a Lancer Evo with a quick-shifting SST, this recall doesn't apply to you.
If you're one of the 10,474 people that has a Lancer Evo X GSR, which is the only way into a manual-trans Evo X, you need to plan a trip to your local dealer. The recall relates to a failure in the clutch master cylinder, making shifting in and out of gear difficult. Consequently, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports that this could increase the odds of crashing.
Mitsu will notify owners of the affected cars, and these Evo models will be repaired, free of charge, at dealerships. The recall is slated to begin around November 11. Scroll down for the full bulletin from the NHTSA.

Lexus tops JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study again, Buick bests Toyota

It shouldn't surprise anyone, but Lexus has once again taken the top spot in JD Power's Vehicle Dependability Study. That'd be the Japanese luxury brand's fourth straight year at the top of table. The big news, though, is the rise of Buick. General Motor's near-premium brand beat out Toyota to take second place, with 110 problems per 100 vehicles compared to Toyota's 111 problems. Lexus owners only reported 89 problems per 100 vehicles. Besides Buick's three-position jump, Scion enjoyed a major improvement, jumping 13 positions from 2014. Ram and Mitsubishi made big gains, as well, moving up 11 and 10 positions, respectively. In terms of individual segments, GM and Toyota both excelled, taking home seven segment awards each. The study wasn't good news for all involved, though. A number of popular automakers finished below the industry average of 147 problems per 100 vehicles, including Subaru, (157PP100), Volkswagen (165PP100), Ford/Hyundai (188PP100 each) and Mini (193PP100). The biggest losers (by a tremendous margin, we might add) were Land Rover and Fiat, recording 258 and 273 problems per 100 vehicles. The next closest brand was Jeep, with 197PP100. While the Vehicle Dependability Study uses the same measurement system as the Initial Quality Survey, the two metrics analyze very different things. The VDS looks at problems experienced by original owners of model year 2012 vehicles over the past 12 months, while the oft-quoted IQS focuses on problems in the first 90 days of new-vehicle ownership. Like the IQS, though, the VDS has a rather broad definition of what a problem is. Because of that, a low score from JD Power is no guarantee of extreme unreliability, so much as just poor design. In this most recent study, the two most reported problems focused on Bluetooth connectivity and the voice-command systems. The former leaves plenty of room for user error due to poor design (particularly true of the Bluetooth systems on the low-scoring Fords, Volkswagens and Subarus), while the second is something JD Power has already confirmed as being universally terrible. That makes means that while these studies are important, they shouldn't be taken as gospel when it comes to automotive reliability. News Source: JD PowerImage Credit: Copyright 2015 Jeremy Korzeniewski / AOL Buick Fiat Ford GM Hyundai Jeep Land Rover Lexus MINI Mitsubishi RAM Scion Subaru Toyota Volkswagen Auto Repair Ownership study