Infiniti action soon

The slow-burn that has been the launch of Nissan’s Infiniti luxury division in Australia could be soon flaring into stronger life with some crunch decisions to be made soon.

The appointment of a new regional boss at Infiniti’s global headquarters in Hong Kong allied with the arrival of Richard Emery into the top job at Infiniti Australia (it comes with the Nissan Australia MD gig) has promoted a review of where the business is at and where it can go and how quickly.

motoring.com.au has previously reported the issues that have surrounded the launch and slow development of Infiniti in Australia, including Emery’s May declaration the brand would be easy to chop here but is worth persevering with for the long haul.

Since then Emery has clearly delved deeper into the operation, along with new Infiniti Asia and Oceania director Dane Fisher, a New Zealander who joined from Lamborghini last March.

Meanwhile, former BMW executive Gaby-Luise Wuest has been named as Infiniti’s new vice-president of global operations with full responsibility for the Asia/Oceania region excluding China, so the attention on our region is growing.

Ironically, she takes up her new job on September 1, the same day former Infiniti boss Johan de Nysschen — who launched the brand in Australia — starts his new job running Cadillac.

“Some changes in management in Hong Kong together with some fresh eyes from me means we are saying ‘c’mon guys, we have to get on with this one way or the other’,” Emery told motoring.com.au.

“So we will make some decisions over the next three or four months.

“I would expect you would see some significant actions put in place for Infiniti between now and the end of the year … in terms of structure and how we go about the business in Australia.”

While it seems unlikely Infiniti will officially expand its dealer network from the eastern seaboard to national coverage in the next few months, the decision on how soon to appoint new dealers is definitely a hot topic because of the implications it has for investment in the brand.

“There are some important steps to take,” Emery explained. “For instance, if you said the next logical places for Infiniti dealers are Perth and Adelaide as an example, as soon as you include Perth and Adelaide your media and advertising money has to be spread across the whole country and maybe you are spreading yourself too thin.

“Maybe you need to continue to concentrate on the eastern seaboard, so that is really deciding from Infiniti’s perspective 'do you stay on the slow-burn or do you accept that you have to accelerate?'.

“That might mean accepting you have to go to Perth and Adelaide as an example and therefore your marketing budget has to grow by 50 per cent to fund a national campaign rather than eastern seaboard campaign.”

Emery said the discussions did not signal an attempt to push more Infiniti models out sooner in Australia, with the next all-new model, the Q30 hatch, not expected until late 2015 or early 2016.

A turbo-petrol four-cylinder version of the Q50 sedan is expected to launch before the end of 2014.

The QX80 full-size luxury SUV, a rival for the Lexus LX470, remains off the agenda.