Despite Renault's help, Mitsubishi fails to relaunch in Europe
- The Japanese carmaker Mitsubishi, which is gradually moving away from its main shareholder Nissan (which is struggling with inextricable financial difficulties), decided three years ago to relaunch its sales in the European market (30 countries = EU + United Kingdom + Switzerland + Norway), after having lost a lot of influence there between 2000 and 2022, going from 200,000 to 50,000 sales in this market, thus losing 75% of its sales in 22 years. At the time, Mitsubishi even questioned its withdrawal from Europe.
(See Auto Analyse 2021-09-7 of 04/19/2021).
(See Auto Analyse 2021-09-7 of 04/19/2021).
- Rebranded Renault models was a quick and inexpensive solution. The models chosen were initially the Renault Clio (B-segment sedan) and Captur (B-segment SUV) sold under the Mitsubishi Colt and Mitsubishi ASX names, two traditional names for the Japanese carmaker. These two models began their careers from the second half of 2023.
- These two models have contributed to Mitsubishi's sales in Europe increasing from 40,000 units in 2023 to 60,000 in 2024, but according to Inovev and based on sales figures recorded during the first half of 2025, these sales will not reach the volume observed in 2024 over the whole of 2025.
- Mitsubishi will launch a third model at the end of this year, the Grandis (another traditional Mitsubishi name) which is nothing other than a rebadged Renault Symbioz, but this model will not achieve either the sales volume hoped for by the carmaker or the sales volume of Mitsubishi from the years 2000-2020.