Nissan's saviour Carlos Ghosn rejects calls to quit
Carlos Ghosn rescued the firm from bankruptcy and turned it in a profitable Corp. after he became Nissan’s first foreigner to head a major Japanese company in 1999. According to AFP, this year, the first time since Ghosn’s arrival the company failed to meet its targets, Nissan's net profit falling 11.1 percent in the fiscal year to March 31. The fall came right after Ghosn took the reins in 2005 of France's Renault, which holds a controlling stake in Nissan, since then he has divided his time between Japan, France and the United States.
Ghosn, the legendary chief executive, on Wednesday refused to resign and said that he will remain as long as he has shareholders' trust and the employees'. He added that this is not a failure, the result of fiscal year 2006 being one of Nissan’s best results ever.
Ghosn has talked of a "performance crisis" at Nissan and taken a series of measures in recent months. He reshuffled top management and laid off 1,150 workers in a restructuring of the commercial division in Japan and will eliminate 1,500 positions through voluntary retirements.
"Nissan is still a hugely profitable company, let's not forget about that," he said, while adding that the problems the car maker is facing today are very small compared to the ones it had in 1999. When Ghosn took over, Nissan was a "keiretsu," a group of Japanese businesses closely linked and often own equity in one another.
Ghosn has faced particular criticism from shareholders for his open skepticism about hybrid technology, which Japanese rivals Toyota and Honda have initiated. When in late 2005 Nissan announced that it was working on its first hybrid vehicle to meet demand, Ghosn insisted that the cost benefits of the cars have not been proven. Nissan is also working on clean diesel technologies.
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