Nissan marks 60 years in Australia with growth pledge amid rising pressure from Chinese brands

Sixty years celebrated, but a shrinking sales base

Nissan this year marks six decades of operation in Australia, with Mr Milette noting in an interview with CarExpert that the milestone falls in mid-October and that the brand's core strengths are a strong Patrol four-wheel-drive heritage and a long-running Navara utility nameplate. The same interview records a second heritage marker: the X-Trail is 25 years in the Australian market this year. The company has also used the anniversary to underline its local footprint, with Dandenong Nissan highlighting that Nissan has been part of Australian motoring for more than 60 years and that parts and components for selected models are manufactured locally in Dandenong South. ¹²

The commercial backdrop is challenging. CarExpert reports Nissan reached a high watermark of 79,747 sales in 2012, finishing sixth among new-vehicle brands with 7.2 per cent of the market, but fell to 12th place last year with 35,511 sales and a 2.9 per cent share. GoAuto adds that sales shrank a further 21.6 per cent in 2025 and 33.6 per cent in the first eight months of 2026. ¹⁴

The portfolio has thinned along the way. According to CarExpert, the redesigned Navara has been declining in popularity, the Qashqai has slumped, the slow-selling Juke and Pathfinder have been axed, a Leaf replacement has been postponed indefinitely, and deliveries of the new Patrol are not due to commence until the first quarter of 2027. Mr Milette told CarExpert the Juke decision came down to business-case factors including foreign exchange exposure on European-built vehicles, while the Qashqai went e-Power-only in Australia to make its business case work. ¹

'Here to thrive': Milette rules out a retreat

Speaking to GoAuto at the New Zealand launch of the front-wheel-drive X-Trail E-Power and X-Trail Rock Creek, Mr Milette said Nissan will not follow rivals that have responded to the crowded market by cutting sales ambitions and shrinking dealer coverage. 'We're not here to just survive. We're here to thrive,' he said, adding that although Nissan has been in Australia 60 years, it is 'adopting a challenger mindset' and moving back into growth mode. ⁴

Mr Milette told GoAuto that the Japanese car-maker's global 'Re:Nissan' restructure, which has consolidated vehicle production and headquarters staffing, 'did not really touch us', and that local decisions not to import particular models were made on their own merits. He also said some established brands had reached a fork in the road and chosen to retreat, a path Nissan is explicitly rejecting. ⁴

The medium SUV segment where the X-Trail competes illustrates the competitive pressure. GoAuto reports VFACTS and EVC data showing 37 brands recorded medium SUV sales in June and July, with the segment up 24.9 per cent to 370,870 units over the 12 months to August and Chinese brands holding 32.1 per cent of segment sales in the first seven months of 2026, peaking at 37.6 per cent in June. ⁴

The NVES balance sheet shaping the line-up

Australia's New Vehicle Efficiency Standard is a defining constraint. CarExpert reports Nissan accumulated a provisional liability calculated at around $10.8 million in penalties in the first six months of the scheme, a figure Mr Milette confirmed was correct and public. He said the company would address it through a shifting model mix and, where necessary, credit trading, rather than raising prices: 'You can't do that, because you're competing with others that may or may not have the same conditions you have.' ¹

A key element is the two-wheel-drive e-Power X-Trail, which Mr Milette told CarExpert started arriving in dealer showrooms in September. He said the X-Trail is Nissan's highest-volume model in Australia in the country's biggest segment, and that with e-Power currently offered only in four-wheel-drive form, the cheaper 2WD hybrid opens the line-up to a wider slice of buyers while producing more NVES-friendly vehicles to offset Patrol and diesel Navara sales. ¹

Mr Milette told CarExpert that Nissan expects to remain in an NVES deficit for calendar 2026 given the V8 Patrols and diesel Navaras currently on sale, and that the aim is to move out of deficit through mid-term and long-term plans. He said the company has 'a very good understanding of where we're going to be all the way through 2030' and hopes to rely less on credit trading over time, though it remains an option in a market that is largely net credit-generating. ¹

New Patrol, Navara Pro hybrid and China-sourced candidates

The Y63-generation Patrol is central to the growth plan. CarExpert reports new Patrol deliveries will not commence until the first quarter of 2027, with the model launching as a twin-turbo V6 rather than the outgoing V8. Mr Milette told CarExpert his experience with the same powertrain in Canada and the US suggests traditional V8 buyers are retained while the modern V6 adds conquest sales from the luxury space. Nissan Australia has also detailed gains in passenger space, cargo capacity and towing capability for the all-new Patrol, positioning it as a full-sized family SUV for Australian conditions. ¹³

Beyond the Patrol, GoAuto reports that potential new Nissans originate from the car-maker's partnership with Dongfeng in China, including the battery-electric NX8 medium SUV and N7 medium sedan, and a plug-in-hybrid Frontier Pro ute that could adopt Navara nomenclature in Australia. GoAuto attributes to Mr Milette the view that the ute is most likely to be greenlit first and quickest to arrive. ⁴

The launch cadence is also accelerating. Mr Milette told GoAuto that a shift to global platform families is shrinking the gap between left- and right-hand-drive launches, citing the next-generation X-Trail as an example with less than 12 months between the first North American Rogue sales and right-hand-drive markets. GoAuto notes Nissan USA has said the new Rogue goes on sale there in late 2026, and that the X-Trail successor is expected to launch in Australia late next year or early 2028 with an all-hybrid drivetrain offering. The current-generation X-Trail arrived in Australia in 2023. ⁴

Local manufacturing and the EV position

Nissan's local industrial presence survived the global restructure. GoAuto reports the Nissan Casting Australia Plant in Dandenong South plays an increasingly important role supplying components for the five-in-one e-Power drive system that is proliferating through Nissan's global product line-up, a point Dandenong Nissan also makes in describing local component supply as part of the brand's Australian ownership proposition. ⁴²

On battery-electric vehicles, Mr Milette told CarExpert that the indefinitely postponed new Leaf was a business-case decision that continues to be reviewed, and that Nissan's near-term focus is on hybrids, with the Ariya serving buyers seeking an EV, which he noted attracts FBT benefits on certain programs. He said resources are going towards 'a wide spectrum of hybrid vehicles', and that if conditions change for the Leaf, 'my hand's all the way up'. ¹

The Ariya's volumes remain modest. CarExpert's interview with Mr Milette cites 147 Ariya deliveries in the first half of 2026 and asks whether that relatively low-volume EV, together with the existing hybrid models, is enough to meaningfully offset Patrol and Navara sales under the NVES. Mr Milette responded by restating the same reasoning as before: with roughly the same portfolio as last year, and efforts spread across the spectrum of what Australians are shopping for, the priority is the widest possible range of usable hybrid vehicles rather than leaning solely on the Ariya. ¹

Mr Milette also flagged openness to expanding the range downward. CarExpert reports he said the Kicks small SUV, previously unavailable to Nissan Australia but now introduced in Japan, remains an option the company is always looking at, while stressing that nothing new was ready to announce. In the EV ownership debate, Dandenong Nissan has argued that established local parts infrastructure matters, citing an in-house comparison in which a front bumper for a budget EV was on backorder at more than $1000 before painting, while an ARIYA bumper was available from Nissan's CEVA parts warehouse in Truganina at roughly half the cost, deliverable the next business day. ¹²

The same Dandenong Nissan article reports an in-house insurance comparison between a budget EV priced at approximately $36,990 and the ARIYA at approximately $49,990, quoted on the same driver profile: a 40-year-old male in Dandenong with no prior claims. Despite the ARIYA's considerably higher purchase price, the dealership says the difference in insurance worked out to only a couple of dollars per week, which it presents as evidence that purchase price alone does not determine ownership cost. It cautions that premiums are highly individual and vary by driver, location, insurer and policy. ²

Nissan's wider local activity continues in parallel, with its dealer news channels listing milestones through 2026 including the Navara Pro plug-in hybrid confirmed for Australia, production of the all-new Patrol commencing for Australia, and the opening of NISMO's first Performance Centre outside Japan. Mr Milette, who succeeded Andrew Humberstone as managing director on April 1, 2026, told CarExpert the company intends to keep right-hand-drive iterations of its products in Australia, one of the most important right-hand-drive markets in the world. ⁵¹