Carlos Ghosn Says Datsun Will Be Regionally Targetted; $4,000 in India and $10,000 in Indonesia

Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn gave a press conference on March 21 giving more details on the rebirth of the Datsun brand. So far it will still be focused on three markets initially - Russia, Indonesia and India. Ghosn stressed that, "Datsun is going to be a global brand with a local product."

He did not go into too many specifics about the cars that would be sold, but stressed that Datsun is going to take advantage of countries' laws to provide a produce that competes in just market. He said that the car in India will cost around $4,000; the car in Indonesia will cost about $10,000; and the car in Russia would be a little more than that. 

The plans to relaunch Datsun have been completed for awhile. It has sketches finished of the cars and a plant to move forward, according to Ghosn. 

Ghosn gave the example of Indonesia where to be part of the green car program the car must have an engine smaller than 1.2l, cost less than $10,000 and have a certain number of parts made locally. He said that the Indonesian Datsun would follow all of those rules. 

The company will do similar things in Russia and India to be able to compete. 

Nissan will enter these inexpensive car markets because it sees an opportunity. Ghosn said that the types of cars Datsun will offer make up 43% of the market in India, 42% or 43% in Russia and 43% in Indonesia, and Nissan has done nothing to compete in those available markets. 

Ghosn thinks that oil prices will continue to rise, and Nissan is prepared for that. 

"If you think that oil at $100 a barrel is high, you ain’t seen nothing yet. When we launched electric cars we said clearly that we are preparing for a long period of time when oil prices are going to be very high," he said. 

There are no plans now to offer any of the Datsun models in established markets like western Europe, Japan or the US. 

Nissan released the entire press conference as a Youtube video, which you can view below.