- Nissan announced the closure of its Spanish factory in Barcelona which operates only at 37% of its capacity in 2019 (against 55% in 2018), due to the shutdown of the Nissan Pulsar, Renault Trafic and Nissan NV200 with combustion engine, and to the failure of the Renault Alaskan and Mercedes X-Class pickups derived from the Nissan Navara. Pick-ups are not in high demand in Europe, so production of the Nissan Navaracould be transferred to Thailand, where Nissan is already producing it for the Asia-Pacific region.

- But the Barcelona site is only one part of Nissan’s objective to reduce its global capacity by around 20%, or about 1.2 million vehicles per year.

- Nissan has also announced that its global range will decrease from 69 models today to 55 models in 2023. Nissan is likely to focus on its major markets, such as North America and China, and to leave the European market to Renault, where it is in a better position.

- In this context, the Nissan Micra (54,000 sales in 2019 against an annual target of 130,000 units) is seriously threatened, Nissan could then focuses in Europe on the C and D segment models (sedans and SUVs).

- The future DS 4 (which will also be available in Crossback version) will be unveiled at the end of 2020 for a production start in spring 2021. It will replace the model of the same name stopped in 2018.

- The PSA group has just announced that this new Premium C segment model, known under the code D41, will not be produced in in Sochaux factory (France) as initially planned, but in Russelsheim (Germany), historic factory of Opel.

- The Russelsheim plant, in addition to the production of the DS 4, will add on its line the future Opel Astra also scheduled for 2021. This factory has a production capacity of 220,000 vehicles per year.

- The Sochaux plant, which has a production capacity of 500,000 vehicles per year, will produce the future Peugeot 3008 and 5008 planned for 2023. These future SUVs will use h the new multi-energy platform EMP2 V4 which allows the assembly of thermal, hybrid and electric powertrains and batteries.

- The three entities of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi group (Renault, Nissan, Mitsubishi) have decided to increase their synergies in terms of product design, production and marketing.

- In recent years, the sharing of platforms and engines had certainly increased compared to the beginning of the 2010s, but it still remained very room for improvement. Indeed, the Nissan Micra produced in Flins did not use the platform of the Renault Clio and the Nissan Leaf was different from the Renault Zoé in terms of engine and batteries. As for Mitsubishi, no synergy had yet been established since the entry of this brand in the group.

- The development and production of common platforms, engines and batteries between Renault and Nissan is difficult and slow within the group. In addition to culture differences and brakes to abandon technologies in favour of those developed by other entities of the group, the range of vehicles and bodies styles produced responding to markets with very different typologies (USA, Japan, Europe , China, Middle East), makes in some cases technologies difficult to share. And this without addressing the questions of politics within the group, where the search for consensus and balance was dominant (with its advantages and inconvenient). By comparison, PSA was able to deploy its platforms more quickly within the Opel range, because it operates “only” on the European market (therefore at a smaller scale), because the range and the bodies between PSA and Opel is very similar and finally because the acquisition of PSA by Opel occurred in a renewal cycle of models favourable to the introduction of new platforms (3008 / GrandLand, 208 / Corsa…).

- Nevertheless, within the Renault-Nissan group, synergies exist naturally and operate at levels invisible to the general public. For instance, the definition and choice of materials used (interior, exterior, powetrain, etc.) is common within the group. With the recent sales and financial results announced by the group, the technological challenges (electrification, ADAS, etc.), and the uncertainty of the markets at a global level, the reinforcement of this synergy is becoming increasingly essential for each of the group's entities.

- Tesla has unveiled the Model Y series which is the fourth model marketed by the brand, after the Model S (38,231 units produced in 2019), the Model X (24,687 units) and the Model 3 (301,318 units). The Model Y is a D-segment SUV using the Model 3 platform. Compared to the sedan, the SUV is 8 cm longer (4.77 m) and 15 cm taller (1.60 m ). But it is also larger. The carmaker claimed that the new model has 500 km of autonomy, according to the WLTP cycle.

- The Model Y targets SUV customers who are looking for a 100% electric model cheaper than its competitor as Mercedes EQC (79,000 euros) or Audi E-Tron (72,000 to 84,000 euros) which are part of the same segment. The Tesla Model Y is sold for 63,000 euros.

- It could even be sold cheaper on a future entry-level version (range reduced to 300 kilometers), as the Model 3 sedan has just been marketed in this type of version with a reduced price of 8,200 euros.

- In the meantime, the Model Y will be produced in the American factory in Fremont (California), in the Chinese site of Shanghai and finally on the European site of Berlin.

- Inovev forecasts 200,000 units produced worldwide for this model, starting in 2021, which should boost Tesla’s growth, as it already exceeded the 350,000 unit produced last year (100 000 units in the first four months of 2020). Even, if we take into account the fact that the Model Y may catch potential buyers of the Model 3, the brand's production volume could exceed 500,000 units by 2022.