Nissan CEO fired, to be replaced by product planning and motorsports boss

Makoto Uchida will be replaced as CEO of Nissan by the Ivan Espinosa, the company’s chief planning officer and head of motorsports, on April 1.

Nissan’s board of directors met on March 11, and asked Uchida-san to step aside in favour of Mr Espinosa. Uchida-san will stay on as a director until the automaker’s shareholder meeting in June.

Since Honda and Nissan officially abandoned their plans to merge in the middle of February, reports emerged indicating Nissan’s board were unhappy with Uchida-san’s leadership and were keen for a change in leadership. There are also rumours Honda is willing to revive merger talks provided Uchida-san step aside.

Other changes to the board include Guillaume Cartier adding marketing and customer experience to his role as chief performance officer; Eiichi Akashi, currently head of vehicle component engineering, becoming chief technology officer; and Teiji Hirata stepping up to be head of manufacturing and supply chain management.

Asako Hoshino, chief brand and customer officer, and Hideaki Watanabe, chief strategy and corporate affairs officer, will both step down.

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At a short press conference, Mr Espinosa was asked about the possibility of reviving merger talks with Honda, how he plans to address Nissan’s lacklustre performance in China and the US, and whether there are any further plant closures on the horizon.

He didn’t provide detailed answers to these questions, stating he only just found out of his appointment as the next CEO, and saying he needed “need some time to reflect” on those issues.

Mr Espinosa has a degree in mechanical engineering, and worked as an automotive engineering analyst at JATO Dynamics before joining Nissan Mexico in 2003, rising to become the head of product planning there by 2006.

After this he spent some time as head of commercial vehicle marketing and then program director at Nissan ASEAN before taking on the lead product planning role in Latin America.

Since 2014 Mr Espinosa has held senior global roles primarily in product development, adding NISMO and motorsports to his portfolio in 2019 and 2023, respectively. Just a year later he was elevated to become the automaker’s chief planning officer.

Overnight he said his experience across different parts of the company, as well as in different regions, gave him insight into what makes Nissan “unique and valuable”.

Speaking at the press conference Uchida-san said, “Since we unveiled the turnaround actions last fall, people not only outside the company but also our employees began to question my responsibility”.

“Given I am unable to gain the confidence of some of our employees and that the board made a request, I concluded that transitioning to the new top management and making a fresh start will be in the best interests of Nissan,” he continued.

According to Uchida-san “the top priority of Nissan today is to break away from the current situation as quickly as possible and bring the company back on the growth track”.

The company is “looking into new partnership opportunities from diverse perspectives and have started to examine various options”, although the outgoing CEO didn’t elaborate on whether these were with Honda, the iPhone contract manufacturer Foxconn, or some other entity.

According to Uchida-san, the new management team are already involved in discussions about partnerships and how to turn the company around.

Looking over his five years and four months in charge of the automaker, Uchida-san said the company had a lot on its plate, including industry-wide disruptions, such as electric vehicles and autonomous driving, as well as Nissan-specific problems, like the aftermath of former CEO Carlos Ghosn’s arrest.

He took credit for “rebalancing” Nissan’s relationship with Renault, which agreed to slowly sell down its stake in the Japanese automaker, take a more hands-off approach, and loosen the product planning and parts sharing bonds between the two firms.

Uchida-san noted Nissan’s “business performance that has rapidly deteriorated” over the past year, and said, “I deeply regret that I have to pass the baton to my successor in these circumstances.”

In February, on the back of another disappointing quarter, Nissan announced it would close three factories, and implement major cost-saving measures in a bid to save 400 billion Yen ($4.14 billion) by the 2026 Japanese fiscal year.

The outgoing CEO spoke warmly of his successor, stating “Espinosa-san is still in his 40s and full of energy” and that “he’s also a real car guy” who has more technical knowledge about Nissan’s current products than himself.

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