Carlos Ghosn is out as representative director and chairman of the board of Mitsubishi Motors, but he’ll remain a board member.
The announcement comes a week after Ghosn was arrested in Tokyo on the accusation of under-reporting his income and using company money for personal expenditures. He denies that he did so. Days later Ghosn was ousted as chairman of the Board of Nissan. In addition to his roles at Nissan and Mitsubishi, Ghosn serves as CEO of Renault and was the architect of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance. He was also working on a merger between Nissan and Renault before his arrest.
In a statement, Mitsubishi said Ghosn had been appointed representative director and chairman of the board based on the company’s relationship with Nissan, and now that “he has lost the confidence of Nissan,” it would no longer be appropriate for him to serve these roles at Mitsubishi.
Of the three allied companies, Renault alone has declined to remove Ghosn, instead appointing Thierry Bolloré to the position of deputy CEO on a temporary basis. Nissan CEO Hiroto Saikawa told employees on Monday that the relationship between the two companies had become “unbalanced” under Ghosn and that he would work to make it “sustainable”.
Since Ghosn rescued Nissan in the early 2000s, Nissan has become larger than Renault. In 2017, Nissan contributed more than half of Renault’s profit, but Renault owns a 43% voting stake in Nissan whereas Nissan only owns 15% of Renault, and doesn’t have voting rights.
The Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance makes one out of every nine cars sold around the world.