Nissan chief apologizes for posting loss, vows return to growth

Mon, Jun 29, 2020
By publisher
3 MIN READ

Business

THE Head of Japanese carmaker Nissan, Makoto Uchida, on Monday, offered an apology at the firm’s annual shareholders’ meeting after the company fell into the red for the first time in 11 years.

This, he said, was due to slumping sales and the outbreak of coronavirus. Uchida, however, vowed to put Nissan back on the path of growth.

“It is very important to boost its presence in the domestic market where the carmaker was born,” Uchida said.

During the two-hour meeting, one shareholder criticised the carmaker for lacking vision for the future, compared with Toyota Motor and Honda Motor.

Uchida expected the carmaker’s global demand to fall by 15 to 20 percent for the current financial year due to the effects of the coronavirus crisis.

Nissan, the alliance partner of Renault and Mitsubishi Motors, has declined to release profit forecasts for the year through March 2021 as the pandemic caused uncertainty.

Nissan posted a net loss of 671.2 billion yen (or 6.2 billion dollars) for the latest financial year ending March 31.

In May, Nissan unveiled plans to close plants in Indonesia and Spain as part of the carmaker’s restructuring.

The number of vehicles sold globally by the carmaker stood at 4.93 million units in the year, down 10.9 per cent from fiscal 2018.

In May, the number of Nissan’s global vehicle sales fell 37.3 percent year-on-year to 272,873 units due to the coronavirus pandemic, while worldwide production plunged 62.6 percent 156,898.

Meanwhile, the Toyota group, including Daihatsu Motor and Hino Motors, also said its global sales declined 34.1 percent from a year earlier to 609,460 units in May, while its worldwide production dropped 56.5 percent to 408,842 vehicles.

Carmakers such as Nissan and Toyota temporarily closed their plants in many parts of the world to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Nissan has been in deep trouble since the arrest of ousted chairman Carlos Ghosn in Tokyo in November 2018.

Ghosn, who once led the alliance, has been charged with breach of trust and falsifying financial documents to understate his income. He has denied the allegations.

Ghosn fled Japan for Lebanon in late December. However, Lebanon has no extradition treaty with Japan.

In May, Jean-Dominque Senard, chairman of Renault and the alliance, said they had no merger plan for Nissan and the French carmaker.

Nissan has long opposed Renault’s proposals for a full merger. The French carmaker owns 43.4 percent of the alliance partner.

The alliance announced a new division of labour designed to cut certain investment costs by 40 percent. Under the plan, a different company will take on the lead roles for each particular vehicle class, technology, and region. (dpa/NAN)

– Jun. 29, 2020 @ 13:55 GMT |

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