Yahoo Autos Mitsubishi President Resigns over Fuel Economy Scandal
After news broke recently that Mitsubishi had been cheating on Japanese-market fuel economy tests since 1991, sales plummeted along with the company's stock price. Nissan then bought a 34 percent stake in Mitsubishi for $2.2 billion, giving it a controlling interest. But the fallout from the scandal hasn't stopped there. Today, Mitsubishi announced its president, Tetsuro Aikawa, will resign.
Aikawa, who has been president of Mitsubishi Motors for less than two years, will formally step down at the annual shareholders meeting on June 24. Ryugo Nakao, executive vice president in charge of quality and product strategy, will also step down with Aikawa. CEO Osamu Masuko will take over their duties, but as of right now, no permanent replacements have been named.
Aikawa is an engineer who made a name for himself leading the development of Japanese-market mini cars. But with those cars at the heart of the fuel economy scandal, the situation ultimately forced his resignation.
In April, the company admitted it had been using "desktop calculations" to determine the Japanese market fuel economy ratings of several cars, and didn't even do real-world testing on its RVR SUV. Nissan broke the scandal when it noticed discrepancies with two Mitsubishi-designed models, the eK Wagon and eK Space, sold under license in Japan as the Nissan Dayz and Dayz Roox.
Mitsubishi maintains the scandal is limited to Japanese models only, but the U.S. EPA has opened an investigation to determine whether any U.S. models are also affected.
