It Sure Sounds Like the Nissan IDx Is Dead
It’s been a while since anyone has said anything of any significance regarding the Nissan IDx, the stylish concept coupe case studies that were revealed at the Tokyo Motor Show in November 2013. These case studies sparked rumors that ran the gamut from being brought to production as new vehicles to becoming the replacement for the Nissan 370Z to becoming the 2017 Nissan Silvia and competing with the Scion FR-S. The last real word about them came in February of last year when Auto News reported that priorities had shifted away from making the IDx a thing, and it was a sad word indeed.
Further confirming that sadness late last week was a report from AutoExpress, which received confirmation from Nissan senior vice president and chief creative officer Shiro Nakamura that the idea of building the IDx (or any variation thereof) to be a smaller companion for the Z and GT-R is about as dead as dead can be. According to the coroner’s report, the cause of death was lack of affordable platform. Goodnight, sweet prince.
“You need a proper platform because it has to be light and small and also affordable,” he said. “In reality, that is not easy to find. It also has to be rear-wheel drive—if we make it front-wheel drive it would be cheating. It is expensive and we are struggling.”
“We have to renew the platform strategy across the company,” he added. “If we can find a good solution to produce something more affordable and light, we can bring it back. Today’s industry is all about platform strategy—in the past it never used to be like that.”
Nakamura also shot down the idea of building the IDx using the Renault Alpine platform because Nissan is “not a mid-engined car company.” So that appears to be the death knell for the IDx. We hardly knew ye. Sad face emojis.
He did, however, confirm that the automaker is going to keep both the Z and the GT-R around into perpetuity. So hey, there’s that.
News Source: Auto Express
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