It started off with Proton confirming that they will be rebadging Nissan’s luxurious Fuga as a replacement for the ageing Perdana for government use and now that tie-up seems to have gone a step further with a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the two parties to jointly conduct a feasibility study to assess new oppurtunities aimed at further strengthening mutual competitiveness in the global marketplace.
The MoU underlines a three month long feasibility study that will evaluate the incorporation of Nissan Motor Company technology and manufacturing expertise into Proton’s next generation of vehicles.
“This study we have agreed to do will focus purely on technology sharing, and in the pursuit of global competitiveness, the strategy of sharing technologies and platforms has today become an important and cost-effective process for all global car manufacturers,” said Proton Holdings Berhad Group Managing Director Datuk Haji Syed Zainal Abidin Syed Mohamed Tahir.
“It significantly reduces the time required to develop new products, extends tremendous cost savings in terms of development, and provides greater flexibility in being able to spin off a variety of vehicles from a common set of components,” he added.
“Successful collaborations between car manufacturers today are as a result of not only the mutual exchange of technology, knowledge and expertise, but also the capitalization of common manufacturing facilities, supplies as well as sales and distribution networks. This will accelerate the launch of Proton’s next generation of vehicles and models that are being designed to appeal to a more diverse and broader market segment both domestically and abroad.”
Don’t be expecting anything like the rendered image shows though as the study would most probably be focussed on passenger cars and the likes. In fact, the CVT transmission used in the Lancer, or Inspira as we know it now, is the same as that employed in some Nissan models and is manufactured by the same company but that is probably just a pleasant coincidence.
