Yesterday, we reported that Ford and Mazda will be parting ways completely, after having lived married, but separated for a while. Ford will retain a token “3 percent or less” interest, why is anybody’s guess. Question for Mazda: What now? In January, we said: “What Mazda needs are strong partners in strong markets.” Back when, the Nikkei [sub] thought Mazda could get closer with Toyota, based on the fact that Mazda decided to procure a hybrid system from Toyota. That alone doesn’t make for a marriage. You won’t marry Safeway, just because you shop there. Toyota wants to become the systems house for hybrids, just like BMW will sell its engines to anyone with money.
Today, The Nikkei [sub] states the obvious and says that Mazda “will likely need to find a new partner now that Ford Motor Co. has decided to drastically weaken the two firms’ capital ties.” Why? Another obviousity: “The global market is now too difficult for a modestly sized automaker like Mazda to survive on its own. And the search for new partner by a Japanese firm renowned for its small-car development capabilities could set off a new round of industry reorganization.” Aha, but with whom?
The Nikkei doesn’t have any eligible suitors on its list. No mention of Toyota. Instead of bachelors, The Nikkei sees a lot of trouble:
“The biggest challenge for Mazda lies in foreign operations. Its overseas plants — located in the U.S., Thailand and China — are all operated jointly with the American automaker. Mazda plans to split up its Chinese joint venture with Ford as a first step toward independence.”
A much bigger problem: Mazda’s small size. They are “aiming for global sales of 1.7 million units in fiscal 2015, up slightly more than 30 percent from the projection for fiscal 2010,” says the Nikkei. “But this trails even Italian firm Fiat SpA, whose annual sales of about 2.5 million units make the firm around 10th in the world.”
So who would want Mazda, assuming that they are on the prowl? Surely nobody in America. Volkswagen has Suzuki, a much better deal (India, China.) Renault has Nissan. The Chinese could buy a 30 percent controlling interest out of petty cash, but currently, such a move would be, how shall we put it , inopportune on both sides.
I’m out of options. What say you?
Bertel,
How does Hyundai make it?
I don’t think they have a large auto partner but have a large industrial complex behind it.
From what I am understanding, Mazda has been courting heavy industries and big money to replace the Ford support.
Would not this be a good way to survive and still keep a sense of auto independence?
Having a heavy industry name behind me feels safer and more concrete a base.
With today’s fluid (shaky) automakers, it’s here today…gone tomorrow.
Hyundai is already in the global top 5 in size! They don’t need any help or partners. They ditched Daimler some years ago.
Paul…
I kind of thought Hyundai was only recently in this top 5.
Before that, weren’t they struggling as late as 5 years ago to reinvent their reputation? And just before that, weren’t they in trouble financially early in the decade?
I even thought that until the very recent burst of nice looking Kia models, they were thinking of dumping Kia.
This to help the bottom line.
In Mazda’s defense, I once spoke to a Ford dealer in a Chicago suburb. He was upset that he was not able to add the Mazda line to his Ford dealership. Rules prevented this.
Now, with Mazda not part of the family, I wonder if their dealerships can increase.
Right now, trying to find a Mazda dealer is pretty hard. This might be OK with high margin stuff like BMW, but Mazda needs some store front.
I put forward Mazda and Volvo work together.
1. They’ve worked together in the past.
2. They’ve engineered good platforms together.
3. They need volume to give their cars profitablity
4. Since Geely own Volvo, they might be able to pick up on some Mazda experience.
Failing Volvo, I put forward Toyota. If only to be Toyota’s “Pontiac” (a proper one). Toyota can stay as the mainstream, vanilla brand and Mazda can be its sporty, youthful brand. The benefit would be that Toyota’s sporty brand goes global and maybe Toyota can put Scion to pasture…?
I don’t know how to prove it, but I believe I suggested a Mazda-Volvo tie-up here a few months ago.
As for Plan B — Toyota… Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! Is that succinct enough?
ToMoCo, in the name of “cost cutting” (code for “we really don’t know how to build fun cars”), would “platform share” with Mazda. The 3 would become a smiling version of the Corolla, etc. Zoom-zoom becomes bland-bland.
I like the Idea of Mazda-Volvo.
Gives one a premium brand; the other a consumer brand. Same as…
Toyota-Lexus, VW-Audi, Nissan-Infinity, Honda-Acura, Ford-Lincoln, Chevy-Cadillac
The Volvo S30/40, V50 window stickers say the automatic transmissions are sourced from Japan (Mazda?)
Mitsubishi. They both desperately need a larger volume to support new development and scale. That would then tie them up to some extent with PSA.
Mitsubishi have no single car the world would miss if they disappeared. If they went bankrupt tomorrow and closed all dealers, no one would notice. I hope Mazda can do better. Same for PSA.
i hope for a strong partner, like Toyota/Hyundai. not one going into extinction. You can’t make the slightly sick man more healthy by exposing him to a deadly sick man.
Mitsubishi killed their best vehicle, the Montero, has let their previous cash cow the Eclipse become more and more irrelevant due to lack of updates, and pretty much lives and dies now on the niche niche of the Evolution.
Mitsubishi can build some great cars, and has in the past had a ‘sporty’ reputation in the US. That would work well with Mazda, but it could be tricky to integrate the vehicles in the same showroom without having them compete too much with each other.
Evo X!
Mitsubishi-Mazda would likely be Studebaker-Packard all over again.
I think from a car technology point of view the Volvo-Ford-Mazda tie-up was perfect and got all partners some decent cars. Mazda has the sportiness, Volvo safety and Ford has volume. Why ford had decided to sell Volvo/Mazda and hang on to Mercury (for a while) and Lincoln is beyond me. Volvo as the luxury, Mazda a sporty and ford as mainstream brand would have been ideal especially since ford’s competence in trucks wasn’t cannibalized by Mazda/Volvo.
now this is history and gone… it will be heard to come up with an equally good match.
they need a higher-volume partner that has modern drive trains (i.e full hybrid, DI etc.), that is where they lack.
– Toyota could sell their (once they improve them) Scion as Toyotas and buy Mazda as a sports brand. any good partner would need to bring a hybrid drive train since Mazda lacks in that department.
– I hope VW doesn’t get involved. First, I don’t want them to de-content the quality (as they do with Skoda since they are too good) and don’t want to spend $ 1,000 to do minor maintenance.
– Maybe Hyundai would be a good partner in need for sportier cars?
– Honda would introduce too much cannibalism (and judging by their cars, they really need some better designers… so they might need Mazda just for that). but both don’t have a hybrid drive train (no, IMA is crap)
Ford didn’t originally drop Mercury because it was a core brand that was started by Ford and had always been a part of Ford. There was no option to sell Mercury – the rights to the name probably wouldn’t have earned much, and sharing the vehicles would have given away Ford’s core vehicle lineup since they were identical.
As for Lincoln, again, it has always been a Ford brand, and I’m glad Ford is sticking with it instead of using Volvo for the luxury segment. The US can support two domestic luxury brands, and if GM can revive Cadillac, Ford, with it’s better product and superior insight, can certainly make Lincoln world class again. Lincoln has withered on the vine a bit lately, but now that Ford is starting to invest heavily back into it we should see a Lincoln renaissance akin to what the Ford brand begun back in ’06.
As far as what this has to do with Mazda –
Ford can still share platforms, engines, technology, etc, where it suits them. Ford of Europe builds great small car platforms and fuel efficient four cylinders, so no need to keep Mazda around for that, but Mazda still needs Ford for the B series truck, for the V6 engines, and for the co-development of SUV/CUV platforms. Ford and Mazda can still share technology and platforms without an ownership stake involved – Isuzu and Honda did it with the Passport/Rodeo, Oasis/Odyssey, and Trooper/SLX.
I agree with the poster who mentioned Tata – it seems like the most logical choice if Mazda is going to shack up with anyone.
Mazda competes with too many 2nd-size companies already, e.g. Subaru, Nissan, Hyundai-Kia, and lately not too well (mostly due to bad advertising and being held back in the US by Ford IMHO), so these other companies I’m sure would rather continue to do what they are doing.
The only companies that would want Mazda would want it for its quality, Mazda would not want them, e.g. Mitsubishi and Suzuki.
The only partners that would make sense would be Chinese companies which have aspirations and could use Mazda’s dealer network, and offer Mazda lower manufacturing costs and access to the Chinese market.
But how does one even find such photos? Google for “creepy Asian guy checks out uncomfortable woman”?
Lets first state clearly: Toyota has no interest in Mazda whatsoever.
The Koreans will never buy a Japanese car manufacturer, and that goes both ways.
Mazda could only be bought by someone with money.
Peugeot has no money. Even if they would, they would buy Mitsubishi and not Mazda.
Buying Mazda would make Tata Motors a truly global automaker.
Tata is a good match, but they borrowed a lot of money to buy Jaguar/Land Rover. Also, Ford offered Tata a stake in Mazda in ’08 when they last divested, and Tata declined. Tata also did not buy into commercial vehicle maker Swaraj Mazda.
I’m sure that Mazda wouldn’t mind having an entry into the Indian market.
Volkswagen Group or FIAT-Chrysler . Mazda would be the perfect partner for Alfa Romeo . If VW wants to buy in the future Alfa Romeo, they will buy now a stake in Mazda . Alfa Romeo Spider based on Mazda MX-5 platform, with bigger engine will be a fantastic car .
This presumes that Mazda **wants** a partner. Maybe the experience with Ford has soured them on the idea of shacking up with another carmaker. Growth will neither be cheap nor easy, but it can happen on its own and without any external help.
This also presumes that Mazda completely severs its existing/future ties with Ford. Or vice versa. It is not a surprise that at the same time the new global Ranger showed its face Mazda also introduced a new B-Series truck. The two may be increasingly separated, but –for example– Mazda 6s will continue to be built alongside Mustangs.
People seem to forget that Ford saved Mazda from oblivion after the rotary engine sales disaster. Mazda remains to small and too indistinct to survive on its own.
In the past I’ve heard BMW can be quite reluctant when it comes to selling their engines to others. For instance, apparently it is (was) quite a big deal that they let Wiesmann use (buy) some of their top engines. I guess that just holds for the high end ones though.
It actually does make a lot of sense for BMW to sell their engines to what will at best be a niche player like Saab and to develop the high volume lower end engines together with PSA, but I very much doubt they’re ever going to sell the more serious stuff. It is also impossible one of their serious competitors would want to buy them and pretty much signal to the public they ‘accept defeat’. Imagine Mercedes knocking on the doors at Munich looking to buy some engines for their cars :)
So as for high volume brands, they’ll only be able to sell lower end stuff to the ‘lower end’ brands, like PSA, which is fine for both parties involved I should think…
Or even Suzuki Motor Corporation . Suzuki could merge with Mazda, they have a complimentary line-up and many common shareholders ( http://www.globalsuzuki.com/corp_info/toShareholders/pdf/2010/notice_regarding_offer_of_shares_to_be_issued_by_third-party_allotment.pdf ; http://www.mazda.com/investors/stockinfo/situation.html ) . Osamu Suzuki as Chairman of Suzuki-Mazda, would be in a much stronger position when he’ll sit next to Ferdinand Piech .
My question is: now that Ford and Mazda are getting a divorce, where are the next Ford platforms gonna come from, they depend on Mazda for all their subcompacts, compacts and mid size cars.
I would buy them if I had the funds…I luv Mazdas..
Abraxis, I would enjoy seeing rotary powered Alfas
Fiat if it can afford it, because it needs the extra volume it would also make them strong in an area of the world where they are weak.
Honda. The combination helps Honda get its mojo back by leveraging Mazda platforms, esp. C-class. And Mazda desperately needs Honda’s scale to be consistently profitable.
Imagine the next S2000 on a stretched Miata platform. A Civic that is fun to drive, because the platform is shared with the 3. A combination Crosstour and RX-8. A Fit hybrid with a wankel upfront — the options are endless.
EDIT: This was intended to be a new post not a comment.
Mazda did not develop the Mazda3, Ford of Europe did its a straight platform mod of the mk2 Ford Focus. I repeat Mazda’s most important model worldwide is 80% Ford and only 20% Mazda. Mazda didn’t even develop the Mazda2 its also just a badge job with a different engine/trans/interior of the Fiesta. Mazda’s ONLY vehicles that they design are the RX-8, MX-5, Mazda6 and the CX-7 that’s it. Everything else is almost entirely designed by Ford.
Do we actually know what we are talkig about?
IS Mazda in any financial trouble?
Well, other than the US dollar/yen values, aren’t they doing well everywhere else?
I think we should be more careful when tossing around a company’s reputation and financial situation when we really don’t know it.
There is new suggesting the possibility Mazda has some very good new products coming and their position will be just dandy. I think many of these new products, especially the diesels, are going to be desired by other car companies for the US market.
Like Ford.
Like Honda.
Like Hyundai.
Since Mazda’s and Mustangs are made in the same assembly plant, and neither has sufficient volume to keep an assembly plant open, then what?
TimCrothers, I call B.S. The models in question do share platforms, but that’s it (“based on”). The point of platform sharing is to work from basic common dimensions/configurations and to customize the design for local conditions, the nitty gritty engineering is done by the respective companies. After all, Mazda engineers know a hell of a lot more of what Japanese customers want than Ford engineers. So Mazda engineers, for example took the Ford B3 platform (which they had a design hand in, btw) and made it suitable for Japanese (and similar European conditions). In the end, the Fiesta and Mazda 2 only share two parts (suspension related). I think Mazda engineers would be surprised to hear their thousands of man hours of design work were actually done by Ford engineers.
http://www.sae.org/automag/globalvehicles/12-2002/
Mazda will likely end up owned by a Chinese company which is looking for know how, a globally recognized brand name and global distribution. All of the second tier automotive companies are prime candidates for that fate. If not China, then India or another aspiring auto maker.
We have already seen MG-Rover, Jaguar-Land-Rover and Volvo go that route. Hummer almost made it over the hurdle, but in the end there wasn’t enough expertise being sold along with the brand name to make the deal worthwhile. China’s government figured that out and killed the deal.