Tokyo, May 27 (EFE).- The alliance between Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi on Wednesday announced a convergence plan that will allow savings of up to 40 percent in investments and which, among other things, includes the decision for the French group to take Europe as one of its reference regions.

The program was unveiled in a joint press conference from Paris and Tokyo led by Renault and the alliance head Jean-Dominique Senard.

The objective of this medium-term plan is to seek synergies to overcome the severe crisis in the sector in the face of falling vehicle demand due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Senard, accompanied by other Renault executives and linked remotely with Nissan and Mitsubishi representatives, said they still had a lot of challenges ahead, but for now they were ready.

The program seeks to share production and after-sales platforms with a leader-follower scheme in terms of models to improve the efficiency and competitiveness of products and technology, principles that will prevail over production volumes.

This framework will allow savings of up to 40 percent in investments in models with this convergence scheme, and will mean that all three firms will have free access to individually developed technology.

The Alliance endorsed the principle of naming different parts of the world as "reference regions," with each company focusing on its core regions for greater competitiveness.

Renault, which holds 43.3 percent of Nissan's capital, will be the reference for Europe, Russia, South America and North Africa; Nissan will be the same in China, North America and Japan, and Mitsubishi (controlled by Nissan) will take over Southeast Asia and Oceania.

Moreover, an example was put forth, that of Brazil, where two Renault platforms and two of Nissan will be combined into one, although no concrete details were provided.

It is expected that, in the case of Nissan, the Japanese group will unveil its own medium-term program on Thursday and clarify whether - as claimed by Japanese media - it intends to close its plant in Barcelona and shift production to Renault factories.

According to Senard, the convergence model has been shaping up during discussions over the past seven weeks to deal with "an unprecedented crisis" in the automotive sector.

As it is a medium-term program there will be no immediate impact, according to Senard, as the situation would not change in a few months, and that the bigger savings measures would be noticeable in 2022.

Senard, responding to a question about whether it was possible for the alliance to extend to other firms in the future, said their alliance was strong and only getting stronger, adding that there would be "some news" in the coming weeks.

The alliance between Renault and Nissan, which Mitsubishi later joined when it came under Nissan's control, was forged 21 years ago with Carlos Ghosn as one of its main architects.

Ghosn fell out of favor following his arrest in Tokyo on Nov.19, 2018, for alleged financial irregularities, and is now in Beirut, on the run from the Japanese justice system.

Replacing Ghosn at the helm of the three firms caused difficulties in the alliance because, according to Nissan, Ghosn had accumulated too much power.

However, over time misgivings and challenges appear to have been overcome, and the coronavirus pandemic has forced the three firms to seek mutual synergies from an alliance that seemed to have entered its own crisis.

Mitsubishi head Makoto Uchida recalled that because of Covid-19, global society and mobility had changed, and environmental concerns were also changing, and as a result, the alliance would also have to change.

Senard took the opportunity to insist that there are no plans for a merger between Renault and Nissan, an option that was speculated months after Ghosn's arrest.

He said there was no need for a merger in order to be efficient, and share their capabilities and get the best out of the alliance, and that in the coming years, they would be even more efficient and create new models. EFE

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