As more and more auto makers are gearing their products towards China, Nissan is also expanding their luxury car market to China, and they are aiming for 10% of the market despite being one of the late-comers into China’s auto industry. Reuters reports:
Nissan Motor Co Ltd said it aims to triple global sales of its premium Infiniti brand by 2016 and take 10 percent of China’s luxury vehicle market, challenging leaders like Audi AG and Mercedes Benz maker Daimler AG.
The target appears “challenging,” Yale Zhang, head of Shanghai-based consulting firm Automotive Foresight, said.
In order for Nissan to achieve it, the Yokohama-based automaker would have to “aggressively push localization over the coming two to three years and aggressively price locally produced cars,” Zhang said.
In China, Infiniti sold just 19,000 cars in the last fiscal year ended March, a fraction of the more than 300,000 sold in 2011 by Audi, Volkswagen AG’s premium brand.
While Nissan expands into emerging markets with the revival of their Datsun brand, they plan to enter China through Hong Kong with the luxury brand, Infiniti.ABC News adds:
Nissan’s upscale Infiniti brand unveiled its new global headquarters in Hong Kong on Tuesday, as the Japanese automaker uses the southern Chinese financial center to grab a bigger piece of the world’s top car market.
Infiniti is the first car maker to base itself in Hong Kong, a semiautonomous region of China better known for its banking prowess and stock market.
Ghosn said the company chose to move the high-end division to Hong Kong so staff could better observe the city’s luxury goods market. Many foreign brands have flocked to the city in recent years in pursuit of wealthy Chinese shoppers.
“During the next five years, Hong Kong and mainland China will together be our most important growth market,” Ghosn said.
