Nissan cuts annual profit by 15% amid management changes

Nissan Motor Co. announced Chief Operating Officer Toshiyuki Shiga would step aside from his position, to a job handling external affairs in implementing management shift as the company struggles with quality issues.

Earlier last month Nissan Motor Co said it is recalling 188,302 sport utility vehicles globally, mostly in the United States, to fix faulty brake control software that may increase the risk of a crash.

In the US, the recall affects 151,695 Nissan Pathfinders from model years 2013 and 2014, as well as Infiniti JX35 SUVs from model year 2013, and QX60 SUVs from model year 2014, the company said. Smaller numbers of SUVs are affected in Canada, China, Russia, Mexico and other countries.

Japans second biggest automaker by sales volume said in a statement that Shiga, would become vice chairman.

CEO Carlos Ghosn has led ambitious expansion strategy for Nissan to boost global market share and operating margin to 8% beyond-March 2017, but multiple recalls due to quality issues and a sales slowdown in China could impede the plan.

Nissan cut its net profit outlook for the year ending March 2014 by more than 15% to 355 billion yen ($3.62 billion), depressed by a sales slowdown in China and Southeast Asia and by the major vehicle recall it announced in September. It also blamed “sluggish” demand in Europe and “volatile” conditions in emerging markets including Russia and Brazil, along with higher-than-expected product recall costs.

“Our new management line-up and regional organisation will ensure the company has the executive team in place to deliver the profitable growth expected from the Nissan Power 88 mid-term plan,” he said in a statement, referring to companys expansion goals.

Nissan said today that overall sales had increased 14.7% to 5.2 trillion yen in the six months to September 30, while net income rose 6.5% to 189.8 billion yen.

This year the car-maker announced it would re-launch the Datsun brand after it was absent for more than 30 years. The Datsun models would be positioned as a low-budget vehicle in India, followed by Indonesia, Russia and South Africa over the next two years. In September Nissan said it would be the first international car-maker to build vehicles in Myanmar. It also aims to double sales in Africa to 220,000 by 2016.

Nissan shares slumped 2.65% while being up almost 45% on a 1 year basis.