Nissan hasn’t ruled out closing the Sunderland plant as part of a radical restructure of the cash-strapped company after talks with Honda over a merger broke down.
Nissan said Thursday 13 February it will shut three plants globally between now and the end of the 2026 financial year as it works to find savings equivalent to £2 billion. The company only named its Thailand plant as one of the three slated for closure.
“Given the latest performance of our company and the changing environment it is essential we explore options without any taboo and carry out a deeper structural reform,” Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida told analysts and journalists on the company’s most recent financial results 13 February.
Europe was by far the company’s worst performing region financially in the nine months to the end of December, with losses equivalent to £354 million, down from a small profit over the same period in 2023. Nissan has only posted an annual profit once in the region since 2015.
Europe’s outsized losses are inverse in proportion to the size of the market for Nissan, which comes fourth behind North America, China and Japan, with sales of 238,000 in the nine months to the end of December, down 2.6% on the year before.
Sunderland production meanwhile fell 33% in the three months ending December, to 61,000 vehicles, with nine-month production down 17% to 203,000. Production peaked at the facility in 2016 with over half million cars built.
Nissan has already shut its Barcelona plant in Spain in 2021 in an effort to staunch persistent losses in Europe, with Sunderland its only remaining European facility.
Asked by Autocar whether Sunderland was safe, a spokesperson for Nissan Europe said that nothing had been specified on closures other than Thailand.
The company decision to close plants represents a change from its position in November when it said it could achieve required cost savings and 9000 job cuts by optimising its global production network, for example by reducing shifts.
In Sunderland’s favour is the fact that Nissan – along with the UK government – has poured £2 billion into the facility in recent years order to build new electric models including the upcoming new Leaf. Nissan’s battery partner Envision AESC is also finalising construction of a new cell plant on the site.
Nissan said on Thursday that Leaf would start production in the 2025 financial year, which ends 30 March 2026.
Nissan Sunderland employs around 6000 staff, which means that closure would represent almost all the 6500 roles Nissan is seeking to axe globally from both vehicle and engine production facilities, between now and 30 March 2027 .
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