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Japanese carmakers, once in full swing, now seem to be starting to be applauded rather than popular. A few days ago, Toyota, Honda and Nissan, the three major Japanese automakers, announced sales in China in November 2022, with Toyota down 18.4% and Honda down 42.8%. The worst is Nissan, which sold particularly hard in November. Nissan, Qichen and Infiniti sold only 45300 vehicles in China, down 52.5% from a year earlier.

As for the decline in sales, Yamazaki Yamazaki, Nissan's senior vice president, said: "the continuing shortage of chips and components and the control of key cities caused by the intensification of the COVID-19 epidemic have had a continuing impact on the company's sales."

Indeed, these factors affect the development of enterprises. Apart from Guangzhou Auto Toyota's 3.5% year-on-year increase, FAW Toyota fell 38.8% year-on-year, while Guangzhou Auto Honda, Dongfeng Honda and Dongfeng Nissan all fell out of the list, with Guangzhou Automobile Honda down 34.2% and Dongfeng Honda down 51.7%, according to retail data from the Federation of passengers' Associations. In addition to Japanese car companies, including FAW-Volkswagen, SAIC-Volkswagen, SAIC-GM, SAIC-GM Wuling also showed year-on-year decline. In this way, the decline in Nissan's sales in China is understandable. However, in addition to joint venture brands, independent brands such as BYD, Geely and Changan have grown in such an environment, and the fundamental reason may lie in the brand itself. nowadays, the advantages of independent brands are not limited to products, but begin to surpass joint venture brands in brand awareness.

Nissan is one of the first foreign brands to enter the Chinese market, exporting the third generation CEDRIC cars to China in 1972. In 1993, Nissan established its first joint venture in China, Zhengzhou Nissan Automobile Co., Ltd., which now produces pickups and SUV Tuda, Qijun Glory and so on. In 1994, Nissan Motor (China) Co., Ltd. was established in Hong Kong, mainly engaged in imported car business.

In 1999, Dongfeng Motor, Jingan Yunbao and Guangzhou Wutian obtained the technical license of Nissan Motor, and then set up a joint venture Fengshen Automobile Co., Ltd., the predecessor of Dongfeng Nissan, to start producing the Fengshen Bluebird based on Nissan Bluebird. In 2002, Fengshen launched the third generation Bluebird, and sales continued to be hot.

In 2003, Nissan and Dongfeng jointly established Dongfeng Motor Co., Ltd., China's largest automobile joint venture, and Dongfeng Nissan passenger car Company to specialize in the passenger car business. In 2004, Dongfeng Motor Co., Ltd. became the controlling shareholder of Zhengzhou Nissan through the acquisition of shares in Zhengzhou Nissan. In the same year, Nissan (China) Investment Co., Ltd. was established to manage its business in China together with the headquarters of Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. to achieve the integration of business in China, development into the fast lane.

In 2018, Nissan reached a sales peak in China, with annual sales of 1.564 million vehicles, up 2.9% from a year earlier, surpassing Toyota China and Nissan China. Of this total, Dongfeng Nissan passenger cars (including Nissan / Qichen) sold 1.3011 million vehicles, up 2.8 per cent from the same period last year.

Like many brands, 2018 has become a beautiful scenery for Nissan in China. Starting in 2019, Nissan's sales in China began to decline. Nissan's cumulative sales in China fell from 1.5469 million in 2019 to 1.4567 million in 2020, leaving only 1.3815 million in 2021, according to the data. According to the latest figures, Nissan sold 974700 vehicles in China in the first 11 months of 2022, down 202% from a year earlier, of which 835400 Dongfeng Nissan passenger cars were down 19.1% from a year earlier.

It is understood that at present, Dongfeng Nissan passenger cars are mainly engaged in Nissan, Infiniti and Qichen brands, among which Nissan brands account for the majority of Nissan's sales in China. Models on sale include Xuanyi, Teana, Qijun, Xiaoke, Bluebird, Tuda, Gunke, Loulan and other models. In November, there was a marked change in Nissan China, which no longer reported specific model sales as usual. However, according to data released by the Federation of passengers, Xuanyi, which is responsible for Dongfeng Nissan and even Nissan's sales, sold a total of 388700 vehicles in the first November, down 16.0% from a year earlier, of which only 22200 were sold in November, down 47.9% from a year earlier. In addition, Teana and Xiaoke are 6880 and 6685 respectively. We have to admit that once Xuanyi fluctuates, Nissan sales will collapse across the board.

Nissan sales Waterloo, in addition to the technology has been relatively backward, product renewal is also very slow. As early as February 2021, Nissan released a new generation of Xiaoke, whose overall shape is similar to that of Xinqi Jun, and is based on the CMF-C/D platform, but so far there is still no domestic news.

During the year, Dongfeng Nissan mainly launched two models, one is the medium-term revamped Teana, and the other is the pure electric SUV ARIYA Aliya. On Sept. 30, Dongfeng Nissan's new Teana officially launched five new models with a price range of 17.98 yuan to 239800 yuan. As a medium-term modified model, the new Teana has made certain adjustments to the appearance and shape, using a new design style, and the power is still equipped with 2.0T/2.0L engines. After the listing, Teana's sales began to decline, from 14447 in September to 6880 in November. Of course, the specific reason is not known, it may be that the terminal discount of the new car is too little, or the shortage of parts leads to limited production capacity, or consumers do not recognize the new products.

As for Ariya, this is Dongfeng Nissan's first pure electric SUV, based on Yuntu intelligent pure electric platform developed by Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance, with a market guidance price of 27.28-342800 yuan. At the beginning of the listing, Takeshi Yamaguchi, vice president of Dongfeng Motor Co., Ltd. and general manager of Dongfeng Nissan passenger car Company, said that Nissan has once again ushered in the baptism of innovation, and the ARIYA will be the most suitable product for Chinese consumers. However, Chinese consumers do not seem to buy it, with ARIYA Aliya selling 456 vehicles in its first month on the market, up from 387 in November.

Nowadays, with the rapid rise of independent brands and the tuyere of new energy vehicles, the advantages of joint venture brands are becoming less and less obvious. In fact, the decline of German-Japanese joint venture brands has become a consensus. According to the latest data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, from January to November 2022, the market share of Chinese brands reached a new high of 49.2%, while Germany and Japan fell, including 19.7% in Germany, 18.2% in Japan, 1.7% in the United States and 1.7% in South Korea.

For Nissan, the traditional fuel vehicles currently on sale, such as Xuanyi, Qijun, Xiaoke and Teana, have lost their advantages in the Chinese market, while the planning of new energy vehicles lags behind, so it is not easy to reverse the situation.

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