Carmakers gear up for joint drive to cut their costs by £3.5bn

A TRIO of carmakers – Renault, Nissan and Daimler – will swap stakes and jointly develop cars in a tie-up that could lead to combined savings of 4 billion (£3.5bn) over five years.

Daimler will take 3.1 per cent shareholdings in Renault and Nissan, which will both hold 1.55 per cent of the German carmaker under the deal, the firms said.

Renault's Nissan stake – the two already have large cross-shareholdings as part of an 11-year alliance – will slip to 43.4 per cent from 44.3 per cent.

Renault and Daimler have been discussing cooperation plans for some months as carmakers worldwide seek partnerships that boost their competitiveness by sharing technology investment costs, as well as gaining scale and access to new markets.

The car manufacturing sector is scrambling to meet tightening emissions reduction rules as it emerges from a savage downturn that has highlighted the need for profit-chasing carmakers to boost scale, conquer new markets and increase efficiency.

Carlos Ghosn, chief executive of Renault and Nissan, said the Renault-Nissan alliance could expect to draw 2bn of synergies from the partnership with Daimler over the next five years. "If you have scale but you don't make scale work for you through sharing platforms and sharing engines and making smart decisions locally, geographically, scale is just complexity and confusion," he told reporters in Brussels.

Daimler chief executive Dieter Zetsche said the potential synergies for Daimler would be of a similar order. "Right away, we are strengthening our competitiveness in the small and compact car segment and are reducing our CO2 footprint," he said.

Daimler, which along with the luxury Mercedes-Benz brand owns struggling Smart, will benefit from Clio-maker Renault's small-car expertise, while Renault and Nissan will be able to make use of Daimler's engine know-how.

Daimler is following in the footsteps of Volkswagen, which in December announced a pact with Japan's Suzuki Motor Corporation. It also called for cross shareholdings and co-operation on engines and small vehicles.

Zetsche insisted the new partnership would not resemble Daimler's ill-fated merger with US-based carmaker Chrysler, which ended in 2007. "Both the start and the ending of (cooperation with] Chrysler will not compare," he said.

The three carmakers said they plan to cooperate on electric cars, passenger cars and light commercial vehicles, as well as jointly developing and sharing engines.

• General Motors posted a net loss for 2009 yesterday, but said it was possible to make a profit this year and that it was laying the foundation to return to public ownership. GM reported a $4.3bn (2.82bn) 2009 net loss covering the period from its emergence from bankruptcy in July to the end of the year. It hoped to repay its loans by June "at the latest".