Why Honda Might Have Actually Wanted To Merge With Mitsubishi And Not Nissan

There are some juicy new details out of Japan this week about the failed Nissan-Honda tie-up, and they make Honda’s initial interest and its quick disinterest make a lot more sense. For all the talk about how Nissan and Honda could complement one another, it’s Mitsubishi that could offer the most to Honda.

It’s quite silly, I suppose, that I worried recently that I’d stop getting an opportunity to write about the companies merging in The Morning Dump. This is a story that won’t go away. There’s a report out saying that Honda was actually eyeing Mitsubishi, with a Nissan merger acting as the most obvious way to accomplish the task of absorbing the automaker.

Nissan, for its part, is hoping it can import more Rogues to the United States from Japan in a bid to lower the price even more. It’s all part of Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida’s plans to save his company without ceding control to Honda. And if it doesn’t work? Honda is apparently still willing to talk merger, just sans Uchida.

Back here in the United States, is Dodge thinking about getting into NASCAR racing again? That would be cool. Finally, Ford is now facing another huge judgment over the roofs of its Super Duty pickups, this time for $2.5 billion.

Honda Reportedly Is Super Into Mitsubishi And Wanted To Use Nissan To Acquire It

Why did Honda so suddenly sour on its potential tie-up with Nissan and Mitsubishi? The three companies went from announcing a technical partnership back in August to a full-blown merger at the end of last year when Taiwanese manufacturer Foxconn expressed interest in buying Nissan.

Last week, it became a little more obvious that Nissan expected to be more of a partner and that Honda, for whatever reason, reportedly decided to force Nissan into capitulation. What happened? One interpretation was that Nissan was too slow to change its course and Honda wasn’t having it anymore.

This appears to be a part of Honda’s sudden displeasure with the deal, but a bigger issue might have been Mitsubishi deciding it didn’t want to get sucked into Honda.

That’s what Nikkei Asia is reporting, and it has some receipts on just how thirsty Honda was:

In an event indicative of Honda’s aim, Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe insisted that Mitsubishi Motors CEO Takao Kato attend a news conference announcing the start of Honda-Nissan merger talks, scheduled for Dec. 20. When Kato told Mibe that he had to be in Indonesia that day, Mibe changed the date to Dec. 23.

If it weren’t for Mibe’s move, we wouldn’t have gotten the base photo for our little The Three Amigos joke. All of this is unnecessarily complex, because Renault is Nissan’s largest shareholder (with some shares held in trust), and Nissan is Mitsubishi’s largest shareholder (at about 34%). To get ahold of Mitsubishi, Honda would theoretically have to please both Renault and Nissan.

Why would Honda even want Mitsubishi? It’s the smallest of the three by a decent degree. Again, from Nikkei Asia:

Mitsubishi has proprietary plug-in hybrid technology as well as a vehicle lineup suited for traveling in rough terrain that is popular in Southeast Asia. These strengths were appealing to Honda.

[…]

Mibe had been signaling Honda’s interest in a tie-up to Kato since 2023. But Kato kept his distance. He was fully aware that significant investments are necessary for automobile electrification and software development, and going it alone would not be an option. But agreeing to a tie-up with a major automaker could mean being taken over.

Aware of Mitsubishi’s caution, Honda tried to get closer to Mitsubishi through merger talks with Nissan.

Honda’s only plug-in vehicles for sale in the United States, at the moment, are the GM-developed Honda Prologue and Acura ZDX. While the company is great at building hybrids, it’s got less experience with PHEVs. Honda is also looking for markets that aren’t China to expand, and there are many places where Mitsubishi (and Nissan, to be fair) are bigger brands.

Mitsubishi, though, wasn’t having it, and walked away from talks after fears that it would be subsumed by Honda. The big difference between Nissan and Mitsubishi is that Mitsubishi is part of a much larger corporation, Mitsubishi Group, that’s even bigger than Honda.

If Mitsubishi Group doesn’t want to cede Mitsubishi to Honda–and it sounds like it doesn’t love the idea–then that’ll make it harder for Honda. However, Mitsubishi Group, via its trading company Mitsubishi Corporation, only owns 20% of Mitsubishi Motor, so none of this is fully resolved.

Also, reportedly, Honda would be interested in the Nissan-Mitsubishi merger so long as Nissan gets rid of its CEO. This is also the outcome that Renault is rumored to want, having lost patience with Uchida.

Nissan CEO Goes Rogue… Get It?

I caught the flu at the end of this last week and I’m starting to just recover, though I had a bit of a setback last night. Perhaps this is why, in my sickness-addled brain, the idea of Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida deciding one way to help save his company is to ship more Rogues from Japan to the United States is so amusing to me.

Automotive News explains the logic of it:

The fourth generation is scheduled to arrive in early 2027, alongside an e-Power series hybrid. A plug-in hybrid will follow the next year.

According to the plan under consideration, lower-priced internal combustion versions likely would be built in Tennessee.

“The economics of building the more expensive electrified variants and upper trims is better in Japan,” because of the yen’s weakness relative to the U.S. dollar, the person said.

Nissan and Mitsubishi smartly decided the former’s Rogue and the latter’s Outlander should be built on the same platform. For the next generation, it sounds like a mild hybrid and plug-in are coming.

The strong dollar and weaker yen, at this moment, mean that it would make sense to build the cheap version here and import the more expensive version from Japan. Additionally, the current tariff regime makes importing vehicles (at least ones without truck beds) to the United States that much easier.

All of that could change in the next few years, and certainly during the lifecycle of the vehicle. What if the dollar bombs? What if President Trump goes through on his threat of reciprocal tariffs?

Building cars is so hard!

Is RAM Going Back To NASCAR?

The NASCAR season kicked off officially at Daytona last weekend and it was a mixed affair, especially for pal and contributor Parker Kligerman. The best race all weekend was probably the truck race, and Parker won… only to be disqualified for bullshit ride height reasons in the post-race inspection. Parker’s team is appealing and, if the appeal isn’t successful, I suggest we all riot.

I thought the Xfinity Series race was also pretty good, and it marked the debut of Parker in the booth now that CW is broadcasting the series. The look is way more modern and it’s a good broadcast team. The Cup and ARCA races were both chaotic and not necessarily in a good way.

And speaking of Parker, I’d entirely forgotten that when he was a Penske development driver he actually raced RAM trucks in the Truck Series (see the photo above). The automaker left the series about a decade ago though, according to Mopar Insiders, RAM might be back next year:

Ram could soon be making a long-anticipated return to NASCAR, with sources suggesting the brand has submitted a formal application to join the Craftsman Truck Series for the 2026 season. If approved, it would mark Ram’s first official involvement in the series since withdrawing after the 2016 season. Meanwhile, speculation continues to grow regarding Dodge’s potential return to the NASCAR Cup Series by 2028, reigniting a brand legacy that has been absent since 2012.

That would be cool.

Ford Hit With $2.5 Billion Judgment In Georgia

Ford has not done well with juries in Georgia lately. A jury in one county awarded a family $1.7 billion over a rollover incident with a Super Duty truck (though it was overturned on appeal) and then, a few days later, a different Georiga jury handed out a $2.5 billion judgment in another Super Duty rollover incident.

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution via The Detroit News:

Herman Mills, 74, and Debra Mills, 64, were driving in Decatur County on Aug. 22, 2022, in their 2015 Ford F-250 Super Duty truck when it rolled over and the roof crushed down on them, according to the suit.

Debra Mills was driving the truck with Herman Mills in the passenger seat when the truck struck a driveway drainage culvert, causing the vehicle to go airborne for about 81 feet before smashing into the ground and flipping over, according to filings in the case.

Ford, for its part, denied that there was an issue with the roofs on these vehicles and will appeal the verdict.

What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD

A few people probably saw the Pavement video for “Rattled by the Rush” as something featured on 120 Minutes. The slack indie rockers didn’t get a lot of MTV play, which may or may not have been the point. If you did see the video it was probably on Beavis & Butthead. “It’s like they’re not even trying!”

The Big Question

How many more times will I get to use The Three Amigos topshot that Peter created?

Top photo: Honda, Mitsubishi, Other People’s Money