The new CEO of Renault, François Provost, who replaced Luca De Meo, would have reopened the possibility of strengthening the partnership between the French group and Nissan. The two companies were linked by a historic alliance, which however weakened after the failure of the Japanese company’s merger with Honda.
Following a scandal involving Carlos Ghosn in 2018, De Meo had progressively decreased Renault’s control over Nissan. In 2023, the failure of the merger with Honda and Nissan’s economic difficulties had led to a very rapid disengagement of the French group.
The relaunch of the Renault-Nissan alliance
The first to report on the new acceleration of the alliance between Renault and Nissan was the Financial Timeswhich cited several sources within the French group. The sudden departure of De Meo from the position of CEO of the French group and the consequent rise of François Provost would have opened up the possibility of a new relaunch.
Before moving to the helm of the company, the French executive was head of Renault’s partnership division. In the past months, at some events, Provost has repeatedly suggested that the possibilities of a renewed alliance between Nissan and Renault are much greater than in the past.
Even though under De Meo the bond between the two groups had weakened, the two groups never stopped collaborating:
- Renault gained full control of partnership with Nissan in India;
- Nissan has started producing its own version of the electric Twingo in France.
Renault sees the alliance as the only way to bridge the gap between the French group’s industrial production and that of other industry giants, such as Stellantis, Toyota and Volkswagen.
The origins of the alliance between Renault and Nissan
The alliance between Renault and Nissan was born between the end of the 90s and the first years of the new millennium. Renault took advantage of a restructuring of Nissan to acquire, in a few years, 43.4% of the Japanese group’s shares. Shortly afterwards Nissan also entered Renault, with 15%.
In 2016, another Japanese brand, Mitsubishi, made agreements with the two companies by joining the alliance. That was the best year of the partnership, which surpassed both Toyota and Volkswagen in sales, exceeding 10 million cars sold.
The decline and retreat of Renault
The situation suddenly changed in 2018. Carlos Ghosn, then CEO of Renault and at the same time president of Nissan, was arrested in Japan for fraud. Luca De Meo rose to the head of the French group and began to dismantle the alliance.
In 2023 Nissan then entered into great economic difficulties. Renault then accelerated its disengagement, bringing its stake in the company to just 10%. Meanwhile, the Japanese group had begun discussing a merger with Honda. However, the project failed at the beginning of 2025 and Nissan began a new restructuring.
The Japanese company has cut over 20 thousand jobs, while Renault has had to account for a loss in value of Nissan shares of over 9.5 billion euros. However, the failure of the initiative between Nissan and Honda and the difficulties of the Japanese company allowed the French group to relaunch the alliance.
