If nothing else, Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn dreams big. In the last 12 months he brought to market both the world's first all-electric mass-market car and the world's first convertible crossover. Earlier this week he unveiled his six-year plan for the company and it's big. Real big.
Coming on the heels of a natural disaster that caused significant disruptions to Japanese manufacturing, Nissan describes its new Power 88 road map as Running to 2016. The Power 88 plan is made up of two pillars: to increase global market share to 8% and achieve an 8% operating margin in the process. How, you ask? By focusing on emerging market growth and an aggressive product schedule.
Unlike General Motors
Nissan aims to achieve this through an aggressive product schedule that calls for an "all new vehicle" debuting roughly every six weeks, culminating in 66 total vehicles. To put that in perspective, Ford
One other key tidbit from the plan: Nissan plans, in conjunction with partner Renault, to move 1.5 million electric vehicles by 2016. For a company like Tesla
Personally, I prefer the story of Hyundai, which is growing sales dramatically by providing excellent vehicles at cheaper prices in some of the toughest segments of the market. Ghosn's newest high-profile idea has serious hurdles to leap before we are all applauding his vision. Still, even if Nissan misses its moonshot, making significant progress toward its goals should grant it a place among the stars.