YOKOHAMA, Japan :Nissan on Tuesday said Ivan Espinosa, its chief planning officer, would take the helm from April 1, ending weeks of speculation over who would succeed Makoto Uchida as leader of the troubled Japanese carmaker.
The automaker will hold an online press conference at 6:30 p.m. Tokyo time (0930 GMT).
Uchida had been under pressure to step down following a worsening earnings performance at Japan’s third-largest automaker and the collapse of merger talks with Honda.
It was not clear whether the appointment of Espinosa, 46, would put those talks back on the table or open up the possibility of investment from another partner.
Espinosa, a Mexican citizen who joined the company in 2003, has spent much of his career in Mexico but has also held positions in Southeast Asia and Europe.
He has overseen product planning and development initiatives and managed the automaker’s global product strategy and portfolio. He has been in his current role since April 2024, a job he took up as part of a shake-up aimed at accelerating the automaker’s pivot to electric vehicles.
“He’s a very passionate product guy,” said Christopher Richter, Japan auto analyst at brokerage CLSA.
“I think it sends a good signal that Nissan wants to give product a higher priority because the Nissan brand has been drifting for a long time and not really standing for that much, and so putting a strong product guy in charge, that could be interesting.”
Nissan has been beset by years of faltering sales and management turmoil, never fully recovering from a hit to its brand following the 2018 ouster of former chairman Carlos Ghosn, who was accused by Tokyo prosecutors of financial misconduct.
During the current financial year to end-March, Nissan has cut its profit forecast no less than three times.
Nearly all legacy auto brands are having to contend with Chinese EV makers, which have upended the industry with sleek software-rich cars.
But Nissan is also struggling to overcome deeper problems such as its failure to launch hybrids in the United States and the turmoil left in the wake of Ghosn’s exit.
Additionally, it faces potential tariffs on vehicles it exports to the U.S. from Mexico, a major manufacturing hub.
Other potential successors named by sources included Chief Financial Officer Jeremie Papin and Chief Performance Officer Guillaume Cartier.
