MMC's New Restructuring Plan
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Restructuring Announcement
May 21, 2004. Tokyo, Japan. No big surprises here. Please read matter related to the USA and the Australian operations by following links towards the top of the page. Regarding its Japanese operations it stated that: "In Japan, the plan aims for a renewed customer-centric sales approach. MMC will successively launch new "Mitsubishi Motors DNA" cars-4 in fiscal 2004 and 5 in fiscal 2005-focused on customer needs. Other steps include offering customers free inspections of their vehicle and 24-hour support, building relations with customers on a company wide basis, improving the company's sales structure by refurbishing dealer outlets and using infrastructure laid out for information technologies."
One thing that stood out was it plans to introduce several new models in its different market segments. "The firm will launch a raft of new cars between fiscal 2004 and fiscal 2007 including 16 in Japan, 10 in Europe, 7 in North America, and 11 in China. The new cars will be steeped in "Mitsubishi Motors DNA," which is best summed up by MMC's SUVs-as typified by the Pajero-and the sporty, driver-oriented traits found in the Lancer Evolution. "
Note: May 24, 2004. mitsubishisucks.com thinks that MMC will be able to cut some costs but we don't expect it to be one of the low-cost producers. We feel that the USA and the Japanese markets might underperform management's publicly-stated forecasts. There seems to be a good possibility of plans being further revised within a year. Details later.
May 27, 2004. Asahi Shimbun reported that in a recent interview, Yasushi Ando, CEO of Phoenix Fund, said that he will lead the newly soon-to-be-formed cross-functional teams' game plan for rehabilitation of MMC. CFTs will report directly to the chairman Yoichiro Okazaki of MHI. A new management team is expected to be announced on June 29.
Yasushi Ando put blame on DailmerChrysler for the current crisis facing Mitsubishi Motors by stating that MMC was treated just like a division and it was deprived of freedom over product design and development. He also put blame on the culture of concealing product defects. His plan is to return MMC to profitability - goal of 120 billion yens (slightly above US one billion dollars) - by fiscal year 2006; and to make an exit soon after that. Our comment: Frankly, we are a little puzzled by MMC's latest attempts to blame Daimler for their problems. Failure to recall and even the poor quality of Mitsubishi autos existed before Dailmer's relationship. Mitsubishi 'Lemon' Autos galore in New Jersey Study 1989-1999
Previous stories in reverse chronological order (Newer ones first)
Pre-announcement Leaks of RestructuringKabushiki Ombudsman Group Plans to Sue Mitsubishi Heavy Industries
Rumors of MMC's Rescue Plan
Investment Amount, Models Slashed
MMC Crisis Management Team Selected