REUTERS
Mitsubishi Motors Corporation has announced today, July 27, that Mitsubishi Motors North America, Inc., (MMNA) a wholly owned subsidiary of MMC in the United States, is preparing to end production of its sole production model "Outlander Sport" at its Normal plant at the end of November 2015, according to the company’s press service.
Its production will be consolidated in Okazaki plant in Japan, pending a final decision by the MMC Board of Directors on July 30, a statement reads.
The company says it aims to find a strategic buyer willing to maintain employment levels.
Mitsubishi Motors' production in the United States started in 1988 as Diamond Star Motors (DSM, later re-named as MMNA), which was a joint venture company with Chrysler Corporation. DSM became a wholly owned subsidiary of MMC in 1991 after MMC bought all DSM shares owned by Chrysler Corporation.
In 2000 the production volume reached more than 222.000 units, but after that the plant faced very steep reduction in production unit. In 2009, the production volume bottomed as low as 18.500 units.
From 2012 and onward MMNA started production of Outlander Sport not only for North American market and but also for Russia, Middle East and Latin America markets, in order to secure production volume to gain production efficiency and improve utilization, as noted in the statement.
With the recovery of North American market, production volume increased to 70.000 units in 2013. Then production order from Russia, which accounted for more than 30% of the total production volume, significantly dropped since the second half of 2014, due to Russian economic crisis, which caused the production volume of MMNA plant to be even lower.
Taking the aforementioned situation into account, Mitsubishi Motors decided to end vehicle production in the United States and consolidate it in Okazaki in Japan as from next model year.