Nissan is currently stuck between a rock and a hard place, requiring desperate measures to get back on track. In addition to closing factories and cutting costs, the automaker recently announced plans to lean on its Formula E racing team for help developing future NISMO performance models.
Nissan Formula E team lead Tommaso Volpe said the automaker has held internal talks about the best ways to integrate racing technologies with road cars. He said Nissan has “exciting plans,” and noted that he’d like to have four or five high-end electric models on sale.
No partnership plans have been finalized yet, but Volpe said the automaker and racing team is working on a proposal to develop “some prototypes based on normal chassis that can help the NISMO division to enhance the performance of electric cars.” Nissan already offers a NISMO-massaged version of the Ariya, but it doesn’t draw from Formula E tech.
Nissan’s Formula E team is set to introduce a new powertrain package for the 2026-2027 season, which will deliver almost 800 horsepower, a significant increase over the current configuration. The move to integrate some of that technology with a road car is the opposite of Nissan’s approach to date, which has been to adapt technology from road cars for use in racing.
[Images: Nissan]
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