Renault-Nissan and Mitsubishi Expand Partnership

Nissan Motor Co. and Mitsubishi Motors Corp. are extending their cooperative agreement across the broader Nissan-Renault alliance to include new jointly developed cars, shared technology and mutual manufacturing capacity.

The three companies say the first products likely from the expansion will be two new Renault-based sedans to be marketed under the Mitsubishi brand:

• A fullsize D-segment sedan for North America to be produced in the Renault-Nissan factory in Busan, South Korea.
• A C-segment midsize sedan for the global market. The partners offered no immediate details about model car and say they haven't decided yet where to produce the vehicle.

The minicar project will be coordinated by NMKV Co., the venture Nissan and Mitsubishi formed in 2011. The little "kei car" will use the platform NMKV developed earlier to carry the 660-cc-powered Nissan Dayz and Mitsubishi eK wagon vehicles introduced earlier this year.