Employees at automaker Renault have been asked to stop sharing their files and data with Japanese automakers Nissan and Mitsubishi starting Monday, taking another step in softening their alliance. “The Renault Nissan alliance ends on November 6. So from this date there will be no more communication with Nissan,” stated in an internal email from department management. Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi “will now act independently and as competitors”, “information will no longer be able to be exchanged, except in strictly supervised cases”, is specified in another email from the training service of one of the Renault facilities.
This decision is part of the reorganization of the Renault-Nissan Alliance – to which Mitsubishi has belonged since 2016 – announced at the beginning of the year and which aims to be less fusional and more egalitarian. Specifically, the companies have signed a new 15-year agreement under which they will have a “15% cross-shareholding”, while Renault previously owned 43.4% of Nissan. They also announced the end of their joint purchasing center, a drastic change compared to its previous version, where it occupied a fundamental place.
There are no layoffs among purchasing center employees
According to a source close to the matter, who confirms the cessation of shared libraries and data between the two manufacturers, this step constitutes the logical continuation of the reduction of Renault’s participation in Nissan, as required by antitrust laws. “We have always been competitors in the market, this word ‘competition’ is not new,” says the same source, moderating the emails. “We are heading towards a new chapter for the Alliance, but it does not have the same shape,” she added, rejecting the term “divorce” used by concerned unions.
The unionist is especially concerned about the “uncertainty” that hangs over the future of the 1,400 employees who work in the common purchasing center or in the French Renault factories that produce, among other things, Nissan cars, such as in Maubeuge, Batilly or even Sandouville. . Contacted, the group indicated that no central purchasing employees would be fired and that “the reorganization is underway.” He reaffirmed that the vehicles whose construction Nissan has entrusted to Renault will continue to be manufactured in its French factories and that the manufacturers will continue to exchange data on their joint projects.
Source: BFM TV
