Daimler, Renault-Nissan further their global collaboration
The chiefs of the Renault-Nissan Alliance and Daimler said yesterday that their companies' partnership was advancing quickly and the scope of the collaboration was increasingly global.
“While our initial collaboration focused strongly on European projects, we are now focusing on synergies in all key markets,” Carlos Ghosn, chairman and chief executive of Renault-Nissan, told an annual media briefing on the partnership.
“The largest economies of scale are always global.”
The French-Japanese-German partnership began in April 2010 with three “pillar projects” focused on Europe. The portfolio has increased to 10 significant projects, including major initiatives from North America to Japan.
Business units are also working together in best-practice sharing and other forms of cooperation.
“We will continue to seek out new projects together that make sense for all partners and, most importantly, our customers,” said Dieter Zetsche, CEO of Daimler and head of Mercedes-Benz Cars.
The CEOs cited the joint production of Mercedes-Benz four-cylinder petrol engines at a new plant in Decherd, Tennessee, as a good example of how the partners profit from the cooperation.
After groundbreaking in May of last year, the building is completed, machinery is now being installed and the start of production is planned for the middle of next year.
The Decherd engines will be used in the Mercedes-Benz C-Class, which is produced at Daimler’s plant in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, as well as in new Infiniti products.
Joint development work is also proceeding on schedule for a new family of shared three- and four-cylinder petrol engines with turbocharging and direct fuel injection.
The engines will make use of the latest technology and will have significantly improved fuel consumption over previous versions.
