Datsun officially unveiled the on-DO saloon in Russia at the start of this month, with Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn saying the country will be the first in the region where all three company brands – Datsun, Nissan and Infiniti – will be sold.
“We’re going to have up to three products launched in Russia and I would say within two years following the launch of Datsun – the sales will start probably in August-September, then the next two years we should hit 100,000 sales, which is going to contribute to position Nissan as the largest Japanese company contributing to development of the Russian market,” he said.
Russia is currently Nissan’s 5th largest global market, and sales of the the 4-door, 5-seat, 1.6-litre engine on-DO will begin in summer.
Speaking at the launch, Datsun chief Vincent Cobee said an initial network of 25 fully-branded dealerships is planned, with another 75 outlets joining ahead.
“We launched in India two weeks ago, and we are going to launch in Indonesia in a month and a half, so Russia is the next big thing,” said the Global Head of Datsun.
“Car ownership is substantial, but still has a lot of potential, especially outside of the big cities.”
The styling of the on-DO was completed in Japan, while development, engineering and manufacturing are in Russia’s own “Motor City”, Togliatti, home to automaker AVTOVAZ, which produces a number of cars for the Renault-Nissan Alliance.
In addition to the alliance with AVTOVAZ, Nissan also has a shared strategy with LADA.
“The fact that we’re using common platforms, between some of the LADA offerings, some of the Renault offerings, some of the Datsun and Nissan offerings, is allowing us to not only go fast, but to limit investments, and to be very competitive because we’re using common parts, and the suppliers are happy about it,” explained Ghosn.
Datsun is expected to play an important role in contributing to the Alliance target with AVTOVAZ of gaining a 40% share of the Russian car market.
Source: Datsun
