Tom Evans in Tokyo writes:

Most motor press conferences end with a Q&A session.  The questions from the journalists can be grouped as good, bad, and totally inane.

And the press conferences here are no exception.  Last night, we heard from Carlos Ghosn, the boss of the Renault/Nissan alliance.  After his speech, he was asked questions such as “why are your cars in such and such a market" so expensive” (answer: it’s the market, and if we weren’t competitive we wouldn’t sell any at all), “what do you think about the collapse of the Penske deal to buy Saturn” (answer: ask Penske (I almost detected a slight sigh, as if “I have enough problems to deal with without worrying about other people’s companies…”), and how long he was intending staying in the job "(answer: ask my shareholders).

Today we were at a sneak preview unveil of the new V-platform car, which will come to the UK next year in the guise of the replacement for the Micra and – presumably – the Clio after that.  Photos were strictly banned and it wouldn’t be fair to Nissan to go into much detail so far ahead of their formal unveil, but the car is smaller than I thought and more of an evolution than revolution design-wise.

But the Q&A fun continued: “How much will the car cost?” (answer: we don’t know yet and even if we did we wouldn’t tell you, but, durgh, maybe it will be priced close to the competition…), “how big are the wheels?” (answer: [man points at wheels]), etc.

The car will be built in most of Nissan’s main markets but notably not Japan, presumably because it is not economic to make such a low-margin model.  It is 50kg lighter than the old one, and the primary engine will be a new 3-cylinder petrol engine, available with manual, auto and CVT ‘boxes.  Perhaps its niftiest feature are the double-U markings on the roof, but these serve mainly to underline the conservatism of the overall design.

Nissan went into great detail about the new production technology behind the car, and especially the fact that local factories in India, China and so on that will build the car will get 80% of their parts from local suppliers, which will simplify logistics and reduce exchange-rate risks.  Nissan hope to sell 1m cars a year based on this platform in hatch, saloon and mini MPV variants.  No 4-wheel-drive versions, and Nissan left the door open as to hybrid and stop-start technologies.

Motor show kicks off tomorrow – can’t wait to check out those crazy concepts for which the show is infamous!

Tom