Renault And Nissan Case Study

Chapter II: Introduction of Renault and Nissan 2.1 History of Renault o Foundation (1898-1918)

In 1898, Louis Renault was a young man passionate by automobile. Louis converted his tricycle of Dion-Bouton into a small 4 wheels’ car. He was able to sell it to a friend of his father that tried it and was really impressed by its resistance in slopes.

In 1899, Louis and his brothers, Marcel and Fernand Renault, officially founded the Renault company in Boulogne-Billancourt, France. Louis was in charge of the development and the production of the products while his brothers took the administrative responsibilities.

The first cars created by Renault were sold to rich individuals able to spend 3,000 Francs for a vehicle, representing approximately

A lot of mergers and acquisitions took place because automobile groups tried to globalize and expand their range of products. Renault had a good market coverage in Europe as well as Latin America. But Asia was a growing potential market for the brand and Renault needed to strengthen its position on this market.

2.2 History of Nissan o Foundation of the company

In 1911, the company Kawaishinsha Motor Car Co was founded in Tokyo by 3 investors, Kenjiro Den, Rokuro Aoyama and Meitaro Takeuchi and started a car manufacturing business. Three years later, the first car is built. It was named DAT after the initials of its founders. This car was equipped with a V-2 motor of ten horsepower and was able to reach a maximum speed of 30km/h.

In 1919, another company Jitsuyo Jodisha Seizo that was based in Osaka, launched the Lila car, a small traditional car.

In 1926, those two companies merged under the name of DAT Jidosha Seizo Co, with a headquarter in Osaka. Because of various car production failures, they decided to redirect the company’s activity and started the fabrication of trucks.

However, in 1930, they decided to make a new attempt in manufacturing cars and launched the DAT

As a consequence, Nissan had difficulties to differentiate its value proposition from others and create a brand identity.

3. No shared-vision or common long-term planning

Because Nissan was “copying” its strategy on other competitors, it was really difficult for the company to establish a common vision as well as long-term goals to its employees. All the moves of Nissan were based on short-term assumptions. As a result, there was no unity among Nissan’s employees.

4. Lack of cross-functional, cross-border, cross-cultural lines of work

Nissan did not only lack of unity among its employees, but also among its divisions. For example, there was no collaboration between Nissan’s headquarter in Japan and Nissan’s division in the United-States. Indeed, the American division was really independent from the headquarter. It was developing its own designs such as the Xterra model, a sport-utility vehicle produced in the plant in Tennessee or the Altima model, a mid-size sedan. As a result, Nissan had strengths that were disjointed and disconnected from benefits that come from a global brand