03 Oct 06
Freedom, as Kris Kristofferson so wisely put it, is just another word for nothing left to lose. Nissan design genius Satoru Tai will second that motion.
He's the man whose designs helped lead Nissan back from the brink and turn it into one of the one of the most admired businesses on the planet.
Let's not forget, Nissan was royally screwed, only seven years ago: it had debts of $22 billion and the average age of its products was a whiskery six years. Now, it's healthily profitable and its cars are about three years old.
There were many reasons for its dire position, but dull and outdated products were at the heart of its problems.
'There was a feeling of real crisis in 1997-98, before the Renault Alliance,' says Tai, Nissan Europe's design vice-president. We walked around the huge modelling studios and thought "Something's wrong - we have to do something". The change started from the felling: "What are we doing? We should be doing better - it has to be good."
'With large sedans there are certain expectations but small cars give freedom of design. I was in charge of small cars, but we created cars of all sizes to the same kind of mentality. There was a spiral-up synergy effect. Other groups of designers in the company would think, "If they can do that..."
'We were lucky that the executives from Renault liked not only our small cars but the design generally, so the engineers had to collaborate. There was some reluctance about the Cube, in fact there were conflicts more or less everywhere, but there was a challenging spirit.'
Today's Nissan product line-up, from Micra via Note and new Qashqai to Murano and 350Z, is remarkable for its lack of ordinariness. Yes, the Primera is still with us, and so's the Almera for a while, but the aggregate effect has been to improve immeasurably the standard of design in the average British traffic jam.
The Qashqai hatch/SUV crossover may not be the most radical looking of products, but it's aimed at a bigger market than the rest of the range. And Tai promises that Nissan's business success won't blunt its creativity. Far from it. 'The designers all met yesterday and agreed that we should go back to that "nothing to lose" mentality,' he told us in Paris.
Nissan Qashqai
Two 908s on the Peugeot stand, both very different but both powered by a V12 diesel. The flight of fancy is the four-seat, four-door luxury coupe. The other one is the real one - and by real we mean next year's Le Mans contender.
The 908 RC is very obviously styled for grandeur and presence, but how much leeway does a designer have in creating a racer? 'In the race car, all the styling is based on technical needs,' says motorsport director Michel Barge. 'It was all done in the wind tunnel.
'A diesel engine is quite a problem for racing. It's heavier, the weight in the back of the car is a little bit high and the tyres have to handle very high torque. So the aerodynamics compensate for this, within the regulations.'
But why make a diesel racing car at all, especially now that Audi has made the point?
'We want to increase technology and innovation, and decreasing CO2 and particulates is one of our brand values [the 908 V12 has two particulate filters],' says Barge. 'It's a whole new racing diesel engine, not two V6s joined together. We launched this idea of the diesel challenge, then Audi had the same approach. It makes a greater challenge for us.'
The new engine is a 100-degree V12 with a 5.5-litre capacity, 700bhp and 885lb ft of torque, and the 908 cossets its driver with electric power steering. The car at Paris is a full-size mock up. When will the real thing be running?
'The engine will run for the first time this weekend [which means it's already happened], and the first car will be built in November for testing in December. It will race in the Le Mans series, which is five European races plus Le Mans itself, and with a few modifications it could also race in the American Le Mans Series. We'll have two cars for Le Mans itself.'
Peugeot 908 V12 HDi and RC
