For years Nismo languished as the pseudo performance arm for Nissan but all that changed in early 2013 when the Japanese motorsport and tuning firm was named the official performance partner of Nissan.
Unfortunately, there hasn’t been much to get excited about apart from the brilliant but pricey GT-R Nismo. Most other Nismo offerings have been lukewarm at best. Don’t believe us? Nismo’s most recent model is a front-wheel-drive econo sedan with a measly 188 horsepower.
Nismo faithful shouldn’t lose hope just yet. Nissan on Tuesday announced the establishment of a new Nismo department focused specifically on road car development. Called Nismo Cars Business Department, the new unit is part of fellow Nissan subsidiary Autech which is a company that specializes in tuning Nissan cars. Why Nissan didn’t just use Autech as Nismo’s road car department isn’t clear.
2017 Nissan GT-R Nismo
In a statement, Nissan said Nismo Cars Business Department will leverage the talents of Autech, Nissan and Nismo’s motorsport arm to expand and enhance the Nismo road car portfolio. Importantly, the new unit will be able to make new products available in a shorter time and in more regions, including here in the United States. This should help increase sales which are currently around 15,000 units per year.
Currently in the U.S. we have Nismo versions of the 370Z, GT-R, Juke and Sentra. And overseas there are Micra, Note and Patrol Nismo models, too.
Since the Patrol is essentially a rebadged Armada, we could imagine an Armada Nismo joining the ranks. We could also imagine Nismo-tuned Rogue and Murano models being developed since the vehicles are sold globally.
