NISSAN - background & news

Japanese car-maker Nissan’s Tokyo headquarters will move back to Yokohama this year. The company formerly marketed vehicles under the ‘Datsun’ brand and is the third largest producers of well-known-cars, including the Infiniti luxury brand. Its main offices are located in Chûô, Tokyo. In its initial years, Nissan built trucks, aeroplanes, and engines for the Japanese military. The company moved its main plant to China after the Japanese drew victory on Chinese territory. During this period, Nissan produced an extensive range of mainstream cars, initially for domestic consumption but later for export round the world. It also produced several memorable sports cars, such as the Z-car, an affordable sports car originally introduced in 1969, and the GT-R, a powerful all-wheel-drive sports coupe. In 1999, with the company facing severe financial difficulties, Nissan entered into an alliance with Renault S.A. Signed on March 27, 1999, the Renault-Nissan Alliance is the first of its kind involving a Japanese and a French car manufacturer, each with its own distinct corporate culture and brand identity. The same year, Renault appointed its own Chief Operating Officer, Carlos Ghosn. The company has since rebounded in what many economists consider to be one of the most spectacular corporate turnarounds in history, catapulting Nissan to record profits. Today, Nissan offers a range of models that could satisfy the most-demanding of customers who are always on the lookout for more. Nissan’s impressive choices include the Pathfinder, Navara, Micra, Qashqai SUV, and GT-R, all reliable and respected models. GREEN CREDENTIALS Green cars, or those cars friendly to the environment, are Nissan’s priority today. The Japanese maker is fully-committed to the development of green cars and is making every effort to go the extra mile for a better world. In 1996, it began development of fuel-cell vehicles. In 2002, it joined hands with Toyota to tie-up on hybrid technologies. It is also hedging bets by developing both a ‘parallel hybrid’ system and a plug-in ‘series hybrid’. It aims to profit from the next generation of plug-in hybrid vehicles and is planning production of a unique hybrid electric vehicle to be introduced in 2010. The hybrid will employ Nissan's own originally developed hybrid technology and its first rear-wheel-drive hybrid power-train.