Renault-Nissan $26B electric push deepens platform, production cooperation

TOKYO -- Alliance partners Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors will invest 23 billion euros ($26 billion) into electric vehicles over the next five years and jointly develop a common automotive electronic architecture as the struggling Franco-Japanese group tries to regain lost momentum.

In its first major announcement in two years, the alliance partners said they will jointly launch 35 new EVs over the next five years. They will also pursue a common strategy to secure global battery production capacity of 220 GWh by 2030.

As part of the push, Renault will lead development of a common centralized electrical and electronic architecture and will introduce its first "full software defined vehicle" by 2025.

The three automakers aim to have commonized platforms underpin about 80 percent of their combined 90 nameplates by 2026, up from about 60 percent today, they said in a joint statement on Thursday.

The investment was announced by the new leadership team, headed by Alliance Operating Board Chairman Jean-Dominique Senard. It is more than double the 10 billion euros ($11.3 billion) already invested by the three partners in electrification. The 35 new EVs by 2030 is more than triple the 10 EV models that are already on sale by Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi.

"Three years ago, the alliance was experiencing a crisis unprecedented in its history, based on a lack of trust,” Senard said. "This period belongs to the past. We have since then bounced back stronger and faster than even the most optimistic could have imagined."

The leaders of all three companies outlined the shared vision for 2030 in an online news conference and painted a picture of unity, after a period of upheaval following the arrest of former alliance chairman Carlos Ghosn in Japan on charges of financial misconduct at Nissan.

The announcement was as much a repackaging of already-announced initiatives as it was a market reassurance that the three companies were still working together and focused on staying competitive. The investment figures, for example, included some $18 billion Nissan said in November it planned to spend over five years to accelerate its own vehicle electrification.

Asked whether the EV spending plan was enough, given it is only around half of the total that Volkswagen plans to invest in the technology, Renault Chief Financial Officer Clotilde Delbos said it was "sufficient," given the alliance's past experience in making EVs.

"We are not a second division player when we come together," Renault CEO Luca de Meo said during the presentation.

Multiple platforms

Under the new 2030 roadmap, the three companies will roll out five common EV platforms that will cover 90 percent of the 35 EV new models.

The alliance already has shared EV platforms, including the CMF-EV architecture which underpins the Nissan Ariya all-electric crossover and its Renault counterpart, the Megane E-Tech. Mitsubishi and Nissan, meanwhile, have developed a shared EV platform for minicars, or Japanese “kei” cars, the so-called KEI-EV.

Other shared platforms will include a CMF-AEV for affordable entries, such as the Dacia Spring, the LCV-EV for commercial vehicles such as the Nissan Town Star, and the CMF-BEV for compact EVs. Renault will take the lead in engineering this compact architecture.

The CMF-EV platform will be the hero architecture through the end of the decade.

Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida said that in 2030, the alliance will be building 1.5 million vehicles a year based on that platform alone. It will underpin 15 models across five brands, including Nissan, Renault, Mitsubishi and the premium marques Infiniti and Alpine.

The CMF-EV will support nearly half of the 35 new EV models on the way.

Other shared platforms will include a CMF-AEV for affordable entries, such as the Dacia Spring, the LCV-EV for commercial vehicles such as the Nissan Town Star, and the CMF-BEV for subcompact EVs. Renault will take the lead in engineering this compact architecture.

Small EVs

Nissan said it would introduce a small EV for Europe based on the CMF-BEV platform as a successor to its Micra. It will be made by Renault at the company’s ElectriCity complex in northern France.

The CMF-BEV platform will achieve a 400-kilometer (250-mile) range and enable a 33 percent reduction in cost and 10 percent reduction in power consumption, the companies said. The alliance envisions CMF-BEV supporting some 250,000 vehicles a year after its 2024 launch.

Renault has said it will become an electric-only brand in Europe by 2030, joining Ford of Europe, Stellantis brands and others in dropping combustion engines pledge as the European Union pushes to halt internal combustion sales by 2035.

The three companies will also focus on solid-state batteries and electronics.

The companies said that by developing shared platforms and electronics, they will be able to have more than 10 million vehicles on the road across 45 Alliance models equipped with autonomous driving systems by 2026. By the year, the Alliance said it will also be the first global mass-market manufacturer to introduce the Google ecosystem in its cars.

The latest announcement puts a forward-looking spin on the alliance's burgeoning recovery.

The November 2018 takedown of Ghosn threw the alliance into disarray amid plunging sales, deep losses, mutual distrust and jousting over the structure of the auto group.

Only in 2020 did the alliance return to some semblance of business as usual, under completely new leadership. At that time, the three companies carved up the world into spheres of influence, handing Renault the lead in Europe, Nissan the lead in the U.S., China, Japan and Mitsubishi the point position in Southeast Asia. Since then, however, the Alliance has been mostly quiet.

In the interim, all three automakers have been more focused on fixing their own businesses than developing joint projects. Soon after Ghosn’s departure, each of the companies was battling falling sales and waves of red ink, as investors rushed to ditch shares in them.

Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi each launched their own revival plans, that involved shedding workers, trimming lineups, closing plants and deep administrative cost cuts.

After notching its biggest-ever loss, Nissan expects to rebound to profitability in the current fiscal year ending March 31. Mitsubishi also forecasts being back in the black. Renault, after its own cost-cutting program that includes plans to move out of its global headquarters building, swung to a small profit in the first half of this year and aims to stay above water for all of 2021.

The alliance is held together in a cross-shareholding relationship, with Renault owning 43.4 percent of Nissan, which in turn has a 15 percent non-voting stake Renault. Nissan has a third of Mitsubishi Motors' stock.

A new structure has been expected by financial markets. Renault has been in the dominant position since it bailed out Nissan two decades ago  but is now smaller by sales than its Japanese partner.

Reuters contributed to this report