Nissan, Mitsubishi, Renault deepen links

Group needs to fend off competition from the likes of Volkswagen and Tesla in electric car segment

Nissan Motor Co. and Renault SA, the carmaking partners that have sold the most electric vehicles to date, aren’t planning to give up that No. 1 ranking without a fight.

The alliance, which also includes Mitsubishi Motors Corp, plans to introduce 12 new purely electric vehicles by 2022 while extending the models’ range and slashing battery costs. And while the group wants more drivers to go electric, some customers won’t actually be driving — the manufacturers plan a line-up of 40 models by then featuring various levels of automation, including at least one auto that won’t require any human intervention at all.

The six-year plan, called Alliance 2022 and announced Friday by group Chairman Carlos Ghosn in Paris, aims to establish the companies as leaders in the electrification, autonomous and connectedcar technologies that are upending the world’s auto markets. Although the shift from internal combustion engines will be costly, Ghosn is betting that sheer size and the sharing of platforms and components will give the partners a leg up in the battle to dominate the future of transport.

While the alliance is the current world leader in cumulative electric-car sales, paced by the Leaf from Yokohama, Japan-based Nissan, the group needs to fend off increasing competition from long-time rival Volkswagen AG as well as newcomers like Tesla Inc, which this year introduced its mass-market Model 3 to great fanfare.

The Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance delivered a combined 5.27 million vehicles in the first half of this year, outselling mass-market leaders Toyota Motor Corp and Volkswagen.

The group is predicting it will end the year as the industry’s top seller for the first time, with expected sales of 10.5 million units in 2017. That number will grow to at least 14 million in 2022, Ghosn said. By 2022, some of the group’s electric cars will be able to travel more than 600 kilometres (372 miles) on a single battery charge.

More than 9 million vehicles will be made on four shared global platforms in 2022, compared with the 2 million cars produced on two shared platforms today. Some 70 per cent of the group’s engines and transmissions will shared globally by then, up from about a third currently. This will help boost the alliance’s annual cost-saving target to more than €10 billion ($11.9 billion) in 2022 from €5 billion last year, Ghosn said.

The alliance is also autonomous vehicles. testing