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Nissan CEO Ivan Espinosa has opened the door to Chinese car makers who might want the Japanese firm to build models for them at its factory in Sunderland.
Chinese car makers are looking at different ways to get a production foothold in Europe to avoid tariffs, with BYD opening its first European factory in Hungary later this year. It’s also rumoured that Chery could use its relationship with JLR to produce cars here in the UK, while Nissan already has a co-operation with Chinese brand Dongfeng in China.
Now Nissan has said that it would be open to making cars for a Chinese car maker in Sunderland.
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Nissan’s Sunderland plant could be used to make cars for a Chinese car maker ((Alamy/PA))
At a presentation on the new Nissan Leaf, which has been nominated for a World Car of the Year Award, Espinosa was asked if the business model for the new Nissan Leaf involved platform sharing with other car makers. He was also asked whether the Sunderland factory could make cars off the Leaf platform for other brands from China, to help them into the European market.
“We’re always open,” said Espinosa. “We have announced that we will be working with Mitsubishi on providing a car for them in North America.
“We remain of course open. We believe at least at this stage that creating more awareness of EVs is something that is necessary. And partnering and working with some other companies is something that helps bring more EVs to the market.
“At the same time, of course it’s no mystery – it helps us with our overall business by adding a bit more scale to the programmes. So, the answer is yes, we are open, nothing to share for the moment in Europe, but it’s something that we are open to consider.”
Nissan has invested heavily in Sunderland with a total of £450m spent to produce the new Leaf, a car that kicked off the rise of the mass-produced EV when it was launched in 2010. The model is now in its third generation. The batteries for the new model are made in a factory next door to Nissan’s plant.
The new Leaf arrives at a crucial time for Nissan. The Nissan Qashqai, which boasts an advanced e-Power hybrid system that allows the car to be fuelled by petrol yet driven by an electric motor, has constantly being one of the UK’s biggest sellers. However, Nissan saw UK sales dive by more than 10 per cent in 2025. Across Europe the slide was less pronounced, but still down by 2.1 per cent in a slightly growing market.
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New Nissan CEO Ivan Espinosa has said that the company would be ‘open’ to building cars in Sunderland for a Chinese car maker (Nissan)
However, Espinosa also revealed that Nissan is no longer chasing big sales numbers, focusing on profitability instead.
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“It’s a difficult market everywhere,” said Espinosa. “One of the premises that we put into our Nissan plan was not to rely too much on the volume, but to have a decent business at the size that we have.
“It’s not that we don’t want to grow, it’s just not like in the past, we cannot rely on volume under the circumstances the industry is in. Now we have not only rising costs from regulation and technology that is being added to the cars, but with so many new players are coming in.
“The goal for me is not to sell more cars, it’s to make more money. It’s really about how we can have a sustainable company with the size that we have and of course first protecting the customers that we have. And second, if we can grow, of course I will take the growth but not at any cost. This is a thing, the premise, we should have organic growth and a company that is profitable. The priority is to have a healthy business.”
The original Nissan Leaf was named World Car of the Year in 2011 and Espinosa said that winning World Car of the Year again 15 years later would give Nissan a welcome boost. “The message will be that Nissan is back, Nissan is a capable company, capable of delivering products that are very competitive and have a clear purpose.
“The purpose of a Nissan Leaf is to be a no-compromise EV, to convince those customers that are considering an EV but are still hesitating for one reason or another to go and try the EV life. Nissan is capable of making history in the EV world as we did two generations ago.”
