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Nissan union wants French to stop meddling with Renault alliance

Nissan is getting some unexpected reinforcements in its ongoing battle with the French government over its involvement in Renault. Its Japanese union, which has traditionally been a very hands-off entity, issued harsh criticism for the French government's attempts to assert control over its alliance partner. According to Bloomberg, this is the first time in 16 years that Nissan's union has weighed on the company's affairs, and it's stating its position on the matter in no uncertain terms. The union called France's attempt at scoring double voting rights within Renault "unacceptable and against the intended spirit of the Alliance." "We support the numerous attempts of Nissan to engage with the French government to find a balanced and constructive solution that will benefit and strengthen the Alliance," the union said in a statement obtained by Reuters. It's unclear what impact the union speaking out will have on the current power struggle between Renault-Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn (shown above) and the French government, but we doubt it'll contribute to any quicker of a conclusion. Related Video: News Source: Reuters, BloombergImage Credit: Itsuo Inouye / AP Government/Legal Nissan Renault France renault-nissan alliance

Nissan alters all CVTs to act less like a stretched rubberband

Among automotive enthusiasts, no one seems to hold a neutral opinion when it comes to continuously variable transmissions. CVTs are either praised for their ability to boost fuel economy or chided for their occasionally poor driving dynamics. Nissan is among the masters of these un-shifting gearboxes in the US, and it uses them in many vehicles in its lineup. However, for the 2015 model year, several models are getting a software update to make their CVTs a bit more like a conventional automatic.
To give drivers the option of feeling gearshifts while on the road, Nissan is adding its D-Step Shift Logic feature to the CVTs in multiple vehicles. Steve Powers, Nissan's senior manager of powertrain performance, told Autoblog the system forces the transmission to "hold a ratio and then shift" to simulate the way that a traditional automatic would. It's simply a change in software, but the company "can't do it to older CVTs," he said, because it would require changes to transmission logic, as well. According to Automotive News, the upgrade is coming to the 2015 Versa, Versa Note (pictured above), Sentra, V6-equipped Altima, Pathfinder and Quest. "We're rolling it out to all programs," said Powers.
Interestingly, buyer perception appears to be pushing the upgrade. John Curl, a Nissan North America regional product manager, told Automotive News that the decision to add the tech partially comes because some owners are bothered that the CVTs aren't changing gears. According to Powers, D-Step "avoids the rubber band feel," that many drivers didn't like. The different sensation of these transmissions seems like something consumers would notice during the test drive, or that the salesperson would inform them about. The same issue cropped up last year when the company was facing customer satisfaction problems among new buyers customers' unfamiliarity with the gearboxes.

Demand for electric car rentals unplugged by range anxiety

It's the hurdle that electric vehicles must clear to be launched into the mainstream: range anxiety. But this time it isn't prospective customers who worry about running out of juice, Bloomberg reports, but renters who return to car rental agencies before their lease is up and trade their EVs in for more traditional gasoline-powered autos and gas-electric hybrids.
"People are very keen to try [electric vehicles], but they will switch out of the contract part way through ... they think they can't get to a charging station," says Lee Broughton, head of sustainability at Enterprise. Enterprise customers who rent EVs reportedly trade them in 1.6 days into the rental period on average, which compares unfavorably to the six- to seven-day rental periods of traditional, fuel-burning automobiles.
Christopher Agnew, an analyst at MKM Holdings LLC, says that longer range would help rental customers' range anxiety, especially since they are usually renting vehicles in unfamiliar places.