Honda & Nissan to Merge

[st13phil]

Well, I didn’t have that on my bingo card. I wonder where that leaves the Nissan-Renault alliance?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/honda-nissan-merger-1.7417646

 

[markjay]

Interesting times ahead...

 

[ChrisPDuck]

I remember when the upstart Japanese car companies were threatening the western incumbents - how strange to see them now threatened by the new upstart Chinese companies.

According to Honda's president, "Frankly speaking, the possibility of this not being implemented is not zero." So if I've paired-off the negatives correctly, it might not happen.

I'd far rather see them merge and survive than go under as separate companies.

 

[Smiley]

This is what happens to an industry when the Chinese enter. Legacy western companies consolidate to save cost and with lots of job losses. The consolidations will get bigger and bigger and will probably end with only a few legacy car maker names left.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

This is what happens to an industry when the Chinese enter. Legacy western companies consolidate to save cost and with lots of job losses. The consolidations will get bigger and bigger and will probably end with only a few legacy car maker names left.

As demonstrated when the British, then the Americans, then the Germans, then the Japanese, then the Koreans and then the Chinese enter.

You start off with lots of computer manufacturers and then, before you know it, just a few. Economy of scale in design, manufacturing, logistics and branding: it’s a thing.

Rented Ferguson TV’s, with valves you could replace, when you just rented them from Radio Rentals: different times.

 

[daveenty]

It would have been nice had they done this a few years ago with the NSX and the GTR, could have been a couple of interesting things there.

 

[grober]

Unfortunately industry commentators have said that the management philosophy of the two companies is very different in each organisation , meaning a seamless integration would prove problematic , likely leading to confrontation on many levels. Only one management philosophy would probably survive meaning all Nissans would be come Honda-like or vice versa in respect of how the many aspects of the final product and its environment-manufacturing survive ----manufacturing plants/research emphasis/ marketing/ targeting buyers /dealerships/servicing/product longevity/styling etc etc

 

[NJSS]

My understanding is that the merger will include Mitsubishi, as Nissan is the biggest shareholder.

Hopefully this will reduce the Chinese threat.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Interesting development but not unexpected. Nissan have been lacking direction for a while and Honda doesn’t have the strength of conviction and reputation that it once did.

All great empires have their time, but eventually fizzle out and are eventually replaced altigether with the next great empire. Car manufacturing is no different, and follows the general shifts in economic power. The US and Europe had its time. Then the Japanese, and more recently the Koreans, and soon it will be the turn of the Chinese.

US manufacturers were seen as a threat by the Europeans, but with some consolidation they coexisted. The Japanese were seen as a threat by the US and Europeans but with some consolidation they coexisted. The Koreans were seen as a threat by the US, Europeans and Koreans but with some consolidation they coexisted.

My hunch is that US, European and Korean manufacturers will coexist with Chinese manufacturers, albeit with some coexistence. Some manufacturers will fail just as they have throughout history. The periods of dominance have reduced with each new threat so perhaps China’s time as the big threat might be shorter than the Koreans.

 

[st13phil]

and Honda doesn’t have the strength of conviction and reputation that it once did

An interesting observation.

As most people realise, Soichiro Honda's Motor Company became hugely successful first as a motorcycle manufacturer, quite some years before they ventured into car production. With their motorcycles they built a reputation for being both innovative and a cut above their competitors for quality. Those of us who have owned Honda motorcycles felt that they sort of lost their way in terms of innovation in the early/mid-2,000's and their current motorcycles definitely don't have the build quality that established their reputation.

With their car division they became known throughout the automotive industry as world leaders in production and manufacturing engineering, allowing them to punch well above their weight against their bigger competitors such as Toyota. By way of demonstrating how important this was, it's not often appreciated how instrumental their production and manufacturing engineering knowledge and practice was in catapulting BMW forward when they bought the Rover Group and picked up all that high-value IP effectively for free.

Why I commented that it was an interesting observation is that the car division seems to be going down the same path of decline that the motorcycle division suffered, but one or two decades later. Poor old Soichiro must be spinning in his grave.

 

[st13phil]

Car manufacturing is no different, and follows the general shifts in economic power. The US and Europe had its time. Then the Japanese, and more recently the Koreans, and soon it will be the turn of the Chinese.

I think the big difference is the CCP.

Neither the Japanese nor the Koreans had World Domination as an overall objective. The CCP does.

 

[ChipChop]

Interesting hearing peoples opinions on Nissan. "Lacking direction" is an odd way to describe the UK's biggest volume car producer for the last quarter of a century. Rather reminds me of the (unjustified?) bad mouthing indigenous UK car makers like BL were on the receiving end of thanks to Clarkson et al. Funny that Clarkson has now come full circle describing new cars as "all s**t now"

 

[pioneercollector]

All of my replacement Nissan vans are ...... Nissan, My personal car is a Honda CR-V ( Which is a great car / SUV / whatever the term is ) and all of my motorcycles are either Honda or Yamaha ..... Obviously there is a German car in the mix!

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Funny that Clarkson has now come full circle describing new cars as "all s**t now"

That’s just age, it happens to us all apart from a few exceptions.

 

[Pontoneer]

Well, I didn’t have that on my bingo card. I wonder where that leaves the Nissan-Renault alliance?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/honda-nissan-merger-1.7417646

Didn't Nissan partner with Alfa Romeo at one point ? I also seem to recall Honda partnering with British Leyland at one point .

Same things happened here in the past with lots of independent car manufacturers merging into or being bought up by larger conglomerates , BL being the prime example .

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Interesting hearing peoples opinions on Nissan. "Lacking direction" is an odd way to describe the UK's biggest volume car producer for the last quarter of a century.

Being big doesn’t my equate to having clear direction. I would say it’s actually more difficult to have direction the larger a business gets. Large businesses with the founder at the helm tend to hold on to it for longer, but all large businesses have a crisis moment - or in some cases plenty of crisis moments - until they either strike it lucky or fold.

The Roman Empire was big, but it too fell from grace, they were pretty big and were pretty big for quite a while. Too abstract? MG Rover became insolvent too and they were a fairly large UK-based volume car producers too.

 

[Pontoneer]

This is what happens to an industry when the Chinese enter. Legacy western companies consolidate to save cost and with lots of job losses. The consolidations will get bigger and bigger and will probably end with only a few legacy car maker names left.

Both VAG and Stellantis have managed to buy up many car companies yet still run them with individual brand identities , despite many components and platforms being shared under the skin to reduce costs .

 

[SpikyMikey]

Didn't Nissan partner with Alfa Romeo at one point ? I also seem to recall Honda partnering with British Leyland at one point .

Same things happened here in the past with lots of independent car manufacturers merging into or being bought up by larger conglomerates , BL being the prime example .

Alfa Arna was the Nissan collaboration IIRC.
Triumph Acclaim had a Honda engine.

 

[st13phil]

Triumph Acclaim had a Honda engine.

Ahh... The Triumph Accord / Honda Acclaim

There were multiple examples of platform / drivetrain sharing during the BL-then-Rover/Honda period, including the 600-series and 800-series.

 

[Pontoneer]

Interesting hearing peoples opinions on Nissan. "Lacking direction" is an odd way to describe the UK's biggest volume car producer for the last quarter of a century. Rather reminds me of the (unjustified?) bad mouthing indigenous UK car makers like BL were on the receiving end of thanks to Clarkson et al. Funny that Clarkson has now come full circle describing new cars as "all s**t now"

I remember them lacking direction when I did the AV for the launch of the original Primera , the first product to come out of the then new Sunderland factory , more than a few years ago .

The event was held in the MacRobert pavilion within the Ingliston Racing Circuit in Edinburgh , and of all things our AV presentation had the greatest potential to go wrong - but it didn't .

The presentation was for the European launch of the Primera , with representatives of every European dealership in attendance , hence the venue was packed , to the extent that there was no room to do rear projection and we had to project from the back of the room , over the heads of the audience : we had a 15 projector dissolve system onto an 18ft x 6ft screen above the stage at the front of the hall ; not only did we have five banks of three Kodak S-AV 2050 projectors , each with 360mm projection lenses , and each bank controlled by an AVL DoveX dissolve unit , and all daisy chained to run off the one cue track , but we also had moving images near the end of the show ( normally this would be done by video projection ( as indeed we did for the VAG 'Vorsprung Durch Technik' roadshow which we took all around the UK ) with the audio on one channel of a High Band U-Matic tape and the cue track for the projectors on another , but the CRT projectors we had in those days had fixed lenses and could only be used with a throw of approx 1.5x the projected image width , hence rear projection ) because of this we had a 16mm film print of the moving images , with the centre bank of projectors going blank at the right moment ; the cue track running off a Tascam 133 AV cassette deck . Just getting 15x 360mm lenses was a challenge in itself as we only owned three , and we had to go to hire companies all over Europe to source them .

We were hugely relieved after the show that it had all run like clockwork , but we had taken two days to setup and done multiple rehearsals the night before .

After the presentation , the curtains down one side of the room were drawn open and the audience invited over to see the new car lapping the circuit ...

Only , the ONE CAR they had brought up WOULDN'T START !!!! There were frantic calls over the radios before , in the end , the car was towed round the circuit on a trailer , pulled by a Land Rover . Questions were of course asked why the car hadn't been checked beforehand , and , as I commented to the Nissan Rep for whom we were working , why didn't they have a spare car .

I think for the Japanese , in a situation like this , one of the worst things has to be LOSS OF FACE .

We all had to keep straight faces in front of the clients , but there were a few chuckles about it down the pub for a while after that one - and just so glad that our part of the job went well .