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Nissan recovery to focus on U.S., Japan, China markets

Nissan will pull back from Europe and elsewhere to focus on the United States, China and Japan under a plan that represents a new strategic direction for the embattled carmaker, people with direct knowledge of the plan told Reuters. The "operational performance plan" is due to be announced on May 28 and goes beyond fixing problems from ousted leader Carlos Ghosn's aggressive expansion drive, the people said. The company's struggles predate the current global economic shutdown. Nissan's 2019 sales slumped severely.  Nissan was already planning to implement what was described as a "do or die" plan in January, before the global coronavirus pandemic froze automotive production and sales worldwide.  Pursuit of market share, particularly in the United States, led to steep discounting and a cheapened brand. Under the new, three-year plan — reported here for the first time — Nissan aims to restore dealer ties and refresh lineups to regain pricing power and profitability, the people told Reuters. "This is not just a cost-cutting plan. We're rationalizing operations, reprioritizing and refocusing our business to plant seeds for the future," one of the people said. The plan also aims to cut competition and expand cooperation with alliance partners, the people said. Nissan will follow Mitsubishi in plug-in electric hybrid vehicle technology, with the smaller peer taking the lead in Asian markets outside China and Japan. France's Renault will likely focus on electrical vehicle technologies and Europe. Nissan and Mitsubishi declined to comment. Renault did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The plan, led mainly by Chief Operating Officer Ashwani Gupta rather than Nissan's low-key chief executive, Makoto Uchida, is aimed at freeing resources to invest in products and technology for the United States, China and Japan, the people said. "The net effect is even though we reduce our R&D spend this year versus last year and make other savings, we pump those freed-up resources back into core markets and core products," said one of the people, who declined to be identified as they were not authorized to speak with media on the matter. The plan is likely to take up to two weeks to be finalized, with sales and earnings targets complicated by the anticipated long-term impact on auto sales of government measures worldwide taken to stop the coronavirus outbreak, the people said.

Race Recap: 2015 Canadian F1 Grand Prix is better behind the front

As of Saturday afternoon in Montreal, Canada, it was all about the number four. Lewis Hamilton put his Mercedes-AMG Petronas on pole position for the fourth time at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, and now his tally of pole positions matches his race number: 44. Nico Rosberg lines up beside him, which is the fourth time that particular one-two combo has occurred this season. Ferrari spent three engine development tokens to try and close the gap to Mercedes, Kimi Raikkonen making the most of it with third position on the gird. His teammate Sebastian Vettel got the worst of it, however, when the MGU-K unit failed during Q1, leaving him 160 horsepower down and out at the first hurdle. Valtteri Bottas put a revitalized Williams on the grid at fourth, ahead of a Lotus lockout of the third row with Romain Grosjean leading the way in fifth, Pastor Maldonado just beside. Nico Hulkenberg got the first Sahara Force India into seventh – the team is still waiting on the upgraded B car that should be available for Austria – ahead of Daniil Kvyat in the first Infiniti Red Bull Racing and a "pissed off" Daniel Ricciardo in the second Red Bull. Sergio Perez made it two Force Indias in the top ten, a welcome result from a team performing below expectations of late. When the lights went out, at the very front it was much ado about not that much at all. Hamilton got away clean and stabbed across the track to close the door for Rosberg, giving Raikkonen a chance to take the inside line into Turn 1 in an attempt to clear Rosberg for second place. That didn't happen, leaving the two Mercedes' to run in grid position for the entire race. It wasn't boring – Rosberg stayed close, rubber-banding the time gap to the leader from a little more than one second to just under four seconds, and Montreal is famous for race-rearranging safety cars and on-track incidents. But none of those occurred, so Hamilton crossed the line 2.285 seconds ahead of Rosberg after 70 laps to earn his fourth victory in Canada and the first-ever victory for the Brackley, UK-based Mercedes team. Valtteri Bottas drove his Williams to third position, the first podium place for the team this year and a welcome salve to heal the team's wounds from a poor showing in Monaco. That placing came courtesy of being in the right place at the right time, which was not far behind Raikkonen when the Ferrari driver spun at the hairpin on Lap 28 after his first pit stop.

Infiniti Emerg-E Concept

The Infiniti Emerg-E is a two-place hybrid gasoline-electric concept that made its world debut at the 2012 Geneva Motor Show. While its sleek shape and stunning styling dropped jaws, those on the green side of things immediately recognized it as a reskinned and updated Lotus 414E - itself a concept based on the Evora that debuted at the same show only two years earlier. Yet there is little wrong with a reworked, Infiniti-badged Lotus boasting 402 horsepower and 738 pound-feet of torque, especially when it features a lightweight, all-aluminum bonded chassis beneath an attractive carbon fiber skin penned by the automaker's Southern California design team.
The hybrid powertrain is all contained aft of the cockpit. Primary propulsion is accomplished with two electric motors, one on each rear wheel, both featuring its own single-speed transmission (this design eliminates the need for a differential and provides electronic torque vectoring control). Energy for the electric motors is stored in a 15-kWh lithium-ion battery placed behind the seats, which is chemically different from the lithium-polymer pack Lotus used in its 414E. Auxiliary propulsion comes from a Lotus-designed, all-aluminum, 1.2-liter three-cylinder gasoline engine, rated at 50 horsepower, that serves as a range-extender after the 30-mile life of the battery pack is extinguished. Teamed with an 8.1-gallon fuel tank, the combo allows the Emerg-E to cruise about 300 miles without stopping.
Offered the chance to take the Emerg-E for a quick loop around an autocross course in Southern California, I jumped at the opportunity.