Nissan is a pioneer of electrical autos, however it misplaced the early lead it achieved with its Leaf, and now it’s struggling to catch as much as newer EV gamers equivalent to Tesla or Hyundai-Kia. A method it plans to make its future EVs extra standard is to promote them for much less, and an organization official lately introduced that Nissan’s next-generation electrical fashions will value round 30% much less to fabricate present EVs just like the Leaf or the Ariya.

In response to Jérémie Papin, Nissan’s US CEO, quoted by Yahoo Finance, the automaker will obtain these value financial savings by “simplification” and “better commonality throughout lots of the fashions.” This implies there won’t solely be fewer elements going into the development of an electrical car however extra of them might be shared with different fashions.

Nissan wants extra and higher EVs

Nissan’s EVs aren’t at the moment probably the most fascinating, though gross sales of the Ariya are going up, and one technique to make them extra engaging to consumers is by making them cheaper to fabricate after which passing on the financial savings to the buyer.

Papin additionally expects electrical and electrified autos to succeed in worth parity with combustion automobiles by the last decade’s finish. A method Nissan may obtain this might be by ditching its plans to go all-in on solid-state batteries by 2028. Nevertheless, solid-state batteries are costly and are not anticipated to go down in worth sufficient till the self-imposed deadline (except there is a breakthrough) to permit the producer to realize the 30% financial savings by adopting this new battery tech—it might proceed to analysis lithium-ion batteries to realize the specified financial savings.

Nissan is just not giving up on solid-state batteries, although, and it’s establishing a pilot manufacturing facility in Japan the place it plans to begin experimenting with manufacturing solid-state cells and packs. Regardless that solid-state batteries are nonetheless significantly dearer, Nissan believes they’re the important thing to bringing the worth of EVs down. It goals to cut back the price per kilowatt hour to $65 by 2028.

Of the 30 new fashions that Nissan plans to launch by 2026, 16 might be electrified, however it didn’t say what number of can be pure EVs. It wants a broader swathe of BEV fashions if it has any likelihood of competing with rival producers, and a spread comprised of the Leaf and Ariya isn’t sufficient.

The Ariya noticed a 44.8% US gross sales enhance in Q1 2024, whereas gross sales of the Leaf went down by over 50% in the identical quarter. Nissan is seeking to launch an electrical pickup truck within the US, which is anticipated to reach across the finish of the last decade and be a collaborative effort with Mitsubishi. Honda is one other potential associate to assist Nissan make extra EVs.