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How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

reuters.com

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Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#101

Post by crowcroft »

onlypassingthru wrote: post #31
alecco wrote: post #8

Japanese carmakers are going to become irrelevant [1] unless there's a major change. But that's very unlikely due to: 1. Supply chains and key raw materials mostly controlled by China 2. Japan's demographic collapse 3. Japanese Gen Z fed up with an unwinnable rat race where they live to just pay rent and groceries It's very sad. [1] https://carnewschina.com/2025/01/13/byd-surpass-toyota-in-ja...

Irrelevant to whom? Toyota, Honda and Subaru all have lifelong customers and for good reason. The cars often last for 20+ years with minimal upkeep. The current crop of Chinese electric car makers are all trying to fake it until one of them makes it and the money spigot keeping them afloat will eventually get turned off at some point.[0] Good luck keeping that flashy EV running when the company goes bust. [0] https:/…

New car purchasing behaviour follows the law of double jeopardy. ie. Toyota has high repeat purchase rates because it has high market share, not because of loyal customers.

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#102

Post by 1-more »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #84
AcerbicZero wrote: post #81

I haven't been following this closely, but what was the appeal for Honda? I mean, Nissan has a few cars that are moving in OK numbers these days but I don't see many routes for a return to form over the long run; Commodity cars are a dying breed.

> Commodity cars are a dying breed. Not in Asia, the worlds biggest car market, and where the worlds biggest car making country is. More than anything, low end electric cars are MASSIVELY popular in China.

You read about the sub like $20K EVs in China and you think "maybe we're due to get belt and roaded here."

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#103

Post by KerrAvon »

margalabargala wrote: post #14
tahoeskibum wrote: post #6

Nissan, Honda & eventually Toyota are going to go the way of Nokia/Motorola after iPhone came out. Cheap and reliable Chinese EVs will take over the market (like Android), while Tesla will probably maintain a halo premium product like iPhone.

Tesla gained a reputation of being the best EVs around, by virtue of being essentially the only company making EVs able to truly replace a gas car for close to a decade. It's easy to be the best in a category with just one competitor. Now that other companies are making EVs that compete directly with Tesla, they aren't reliably best-in-class or best-in-price-point anymore. Compare the Rivian R1T to the Cybertruck, or…

Lucid has a viable Model S competitor. I haven't driven one, but they're very well-reviewed and they beat the Model S specs for range.

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#104

Post by galimalint »

gabruoy wrote: post #77
alecco wrote: post #8

Japanese carmakers are going to become irrelevant [1] unless there's a major change. But that's very unlikely due to: 1. Supply chains and key raw materials mostly controlled by China 2. Japan's demographic collapse 3. Japanese Gen Z fed up with an unwinnable rat race where they live to just pay rent and groceries It's very sad. [1] https://carnewschina.com/2025/01/13/byd-surpass-toyota-in-ja...

I don't understand what point you're trying to make with your source. A relatively new company in the Japanese market (BYD) has increased sales in its specialized niche of EVs, beating out a minor competitor that sells only one model of EV as an option to it's brand loyal customers (Toyota, BZ4X). Meanwhile, the EV market as a whole has declined significantly in Japan over the last year.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Automobiles/Electric-vehicl...

Sales of EVs in Japan fell 33% y/y to 59,736 cars in 2024, the first decline in 4 years.

EV's share of all vehicle sales fell below 2% in Japan

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#105

Post by [deleted] »

metadat wrote: post #98
kridsdale1 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meanwhile I bought a 2024 Toyota that gets 10mpg and I fucking love it.

Which 2024 Toyota gets 10mpg? For example, the formerly beefcake Landcruiser went from a beastly guzzling v8 in 2021 to a weaker v6 in 2022-2023, and now, in 2024, a weak 2.4L supercharged 4-cyl sipper. R.I.P. Landcruiser of old, you were an ultimate vehicle in your category.

[deleted]

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#106

Post by Dalewyn »

somerandomqaguy wrote: post #87
AcerbicZero wrote: post #81

I haven't been following this closely, but what was the appeal for Honda? I mean, Nissan has a few cars that are moving in OK numbers these days but I don't see many routes for a return to form over the long run; Commodity cars are a dying breed.

Rumour mill is that the Japanese government was pressuring Honda to merge with Nissan to save Nissan. During a press conference the CEO of Honda Toshihiro Mibe couldn't articulate a reason justifying the merger. https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/honda-s-ceo-struggles-t...

Pretty much this. Honda was all but begged by the Japanese government to bail Nissan out. Remember that the Japanese government had a role in taking out Renault and preventing a French takeover of Nissan, their political hand was already overstretched.

The merger/buyout collapsed because Nissan is too proud to admit that they have failed and aren't in any position to be making demands.

Also, this is a tangent but with the US Steel buyout/investment from Nippon Steel being a common subject matter these days, remember what Japan did to protect Nissan every time they bitch about the US protecting US Steel. What goes around comes around.

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#107

Post by jszymborski »

r00fus wrote: post #53
mongol wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tesla is going down the drain, at least in Europe, unless shareholders evict Musk. Nothing iPhone-like with that brand anymore.

Not just Europe: CA sales are down double digits recently as well: https://www.newsweek.com/tesla-california-sales-decline-elec...

Doing poorly in the other CA (Canada) as well

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/tesla-sales-drop-1.7421653

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#108

Post by m463 »

thuddrff567gg wrote: post #93
csours wrote: post #5

At this point I feel like a rising stock price after a crisis should be a major red flag for long term corporate survival. Carlos Ghosn was able to "turn Nissan around", but it was at the expense of future product capabilities (in my opinion) [Disclosure I work for GM, this is solely my own opinion] Also, I must say that it is not clear to me that anyone could know what a long term winning play looked like 10-15 year…

This seems to be the classic way in which management types destroy technical companies. Same thing happened a decade back in electronics companies in Japan (Sony comes to mind). Technical competence is generally very hard to judge and often even harder replace. It's not surprising that the same management types are salivating at the thought of replacing people with AI.

I kind of wonder if the endgame for all of this is one-product-per-company.

The company comes into being to make widget x, and never cares / is able to make another product again.

I mean, that's kind of how it all happens anyway. The people who stick through things and make the thing go away anyway. the ip is then acquired.

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#109

Post by alexey-salmin »

thuddrff567gg wrote: post #93
csours wrote: post #5

At this point I feel like a rising stock price after a crisis should be a major red flag for long term corporate survival. Carlos Ghosn was able to "turn Nissan around", but it was at the expense of future product capabilities (in my opinion) [Disclosure I work for GM, this is solely my own opinion] Also, I must say that it is not clear to me that anyone could know what a long term winning play looked like 10-15 year…

This seems to be the classic way in which management types destroy technical companies. Same thing happened a decade back in electronics companies in Japan (Sony comes to mind). Technical competence is generally very hard to judge and often even harder replace. It's not surprising that the same management types are salivating at the thought of replacing people with AI.

I don't know, the Renault Logan (and the B platform in general) was extremely good from the engineering standpoint. Cheap, reliable, easy to maintain, easy to fix. The technical competence in building gasoline cars was definitely there.

They missed the electric wave sure, but as with any innovations the more competent you are in the previous wave of technology the harder it is to switch to the new one. But it's a different kind of problem.

Re: How Nissan and Honda's $60B merger talks collapsed

#110

Post by JamesSwift »

VectorLock wrote: post #9
bearjaws wrote: post #2

IMO a Honda Nissan merger would have been terrible for Honda. Nissan is clearly an anchor, and acquiring it would have just dragged Honda down .

Its too bad since Honda has seemed to have totally lost its luster the past decade or so. Honda was Apple to Toyota's Microsoft for a long time, now their cars are bland and undifferentiated, rather than the innovative leaders they used to be.

Uhh, the Odyssey is still best of breed for minivans in the price segment.
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