Ivan Espinosa, chief govt officer of Nissan Motor Co., speaks throughout an interview on the firm’s headquarters in Yokohama, Japan, on Thursday, Might 15, 2025.
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Nissan CEO Ivan Espinosa on Wednesday stated the short-term focus is to repair the struggling automaker, because it undergoes main restructuring efforts to get again on a strong footing.
“I believe within the brief time period, the main target that we now have is to repair ourselves,” Espinosa informed CNBC’s “Squawk Field Europe.”
“We’re satisfied that the plan is sufficient and sturdy,” he added.
Espinosa, who solely assumed management of the Japanese automaker in April, faces an uphill battle to alter the tide of Nissan’s whittled down fortunes.
The agency has been contending with declining gross sales, the transition to electrical autos and steep world competitors, notably from Chinese language rivals.
These challenges have now been exacerbated by U.S. President Donald Trump’s sweeping 50% world tariffs on metal and aluminum, together with different so-called reciprocal levies on particular person nations which are briefly diminished underneath a reprieve set to run out in July.
Final month, Espinosa revealed the corporate’s plans to slash 11,000 jobs and shut down seven crops, amid expectations of a 3% drop in sale volumes within the present fiscal 12 months.
On the finish of final 12 months, the corporate fleetingly flirted with a potential tie-up with Japanese peer Honda in talks that might have created the world’s third largest automaker by gross sales — however negotiations broke down in February.
“The dimensions of the duty is large,” Espinosa stated.
“Our touchdown was not good in 2024, and thus we now have a change that has to return. However this can be a drawback that didn’t begin like two years in the past, it is a elementary drawback that we’re fixing. In case you take a step again, eight to 10 years in the past, the corporate had very lofty objectives for development.”
Nissan’s administration had beforehand focused annual gross sales of 8 million vehicles per 12 months, and, as such, the corporate invested closely on capability, human assets and capital expenditure.
Finally, nevertheless, the corporate peaked at annual gross sales of 5.6 million — again in 2016 — and Nissan is now working at gross sales of three.3 million to three.4 million vehicles per 12 months, Espinosa stated.
“We’re re-sizing the corporate and for this reason we now have accelerated our efforts on price, each fastened price [and] viable price. So, we now have very deep initiatives underneath our new Re:Nissan plan and we’re dedicated to it,” Espinosa stated.
Tokyo-listed shares of Nissan are down 24% year-to-date.