mmarshall

Move over, VW....you're not alone. Mitsubishi, as if it doesn't already have enough troubles in the American market, now has to contend with a growing mileage scandal. Its main HQ and a factory in Japan were raided by the Japanese government, although, as of yet, few details of the raid have been released. It seems to be directed at vehicles sold in Japan, though, not here in the U.S, where the Japanese government obviously has no authority.

Although the company is still a pretty good-sized one at home in Japan and in other countries, I still think it is just a matter of time before the company stops selling new vehicles here in America, period. Where I live, in the Northern VA D.C. suburbs, there are NO more new-car Mitsubishi dealerships left, although a few can still be found across the Potomac in Maryland, and between D.C. and Baltmore. I've only done one Mitsubishi review in the last few years....on a base-level 13K Mirage, not by request, but just to see if it was as poor a car as Consumer Reports said it was (not quite, but close) It was at the last remaining Northern Virginia outlet, and now that is gone, too.

http://www.autoblog.com/2016/09/02/m...an-government/

Mitsubishi's fuel economy scandal continues to grow, and the Japanese government wants answers. According to Reuters, the Japanese Transport Ministry raided the company's headquarters and a factory in Nagoya today.

This raid comes soon after the company revealed that a number of its SUVs were also being sold with incorrect fuel economy ratings. The Japanese government issued a stop-sale on those vehicles a few days ago. This raid also follows an internal investigation conducted by Mitsubishi to discover how this fuel economy scandal happened, and how the practices that led to it were able to continue for 25 years.

The internal investigation revealed a few contributing factors that all fell under issues with the company's culture. There was significant pressure throughout the company to reach fuel economy targets and missing them wasn't readily accepted. Questioning decisions of management was also discouraged, and it seemed the different divisions of the company weren't working well together.

The findings of this raid have yet to be revealed, but it will be interesting to see how they compare with those of the internal investigation. The Japanese Transport Ministry seems intent on preventing a repeat of this with another company considering that, according to Reuters, it "sent documents to other automakers to enforce compliance with rules for calculating mileage."

Sulu

Has the sale of 34% of Mitsubishi Motors shares (controlling interest in Japan) to Nissan been approved? If so, has the sale closed? And if so, has Nissan replaced any of the senior management yet (as they are legally entitled to do once they own one-third of the shares)?

mmarshall

As far as I know, the sale has gone through on paper. Whether it's active or not in actual day-to-day operations, I'm not sure of.