Mitsubishi’s future in Europe is currently up in the air after comments made by the carmaker’s chairman, Osamu Masuko. The Japanese brand lost money in Europe in the past two fiscal years, with a net loss of $130 million for the quarter that ended on March 31.
“For the moment it is not very clear to us,” Masuko said during a news conference in which the alliance announced its “leader-follower” strategy, with each brand having control of specific regions, as reported by Autonews Europe.
“We still need more time to fix our future direction in Europe,” said the Mitsubishi boss.
Related: Nissan And Renault To Fix Their Alliance Rather Than Pursue Merger
Mitsubishi will reveal its European strategy “in a few weeks”, said a spokesman for the brand, adding that “when it comes to further regional specifics, we will have to wait until MMC will announce our own mid-term plan to see where Europe fits (scope, volume, models, technology) within that new bigger alliance framework.”
All of Mitsubishi’s cars for Europe are actually built in Asia, and since volume for the EU is so small, moving production to the Old Continent doesn’t make much sense – although Renault does make a van for Mitsubishi in France, for sale in southeast Asia and Australia.
Moving forward, the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance has designated the latter as the lead brand for plug-in hybrid technology in the compact and midsize segments, which we can understand seen as how the Outlander was Europe’s best-selling plug-in hybrid vehicle.
Mitsubishi’s second-best-selling car in Europe is the Mirage small hatchback, with sales of 11,667 through April, although its future remains uncertain given its age and future emissions legislation.
