A Rock Star Is Reborn

Ghosn is back out on the road, rehabbing his—and his company's—image. NEWSWEEK went along for the ride, spending three days riding shotgun with him last month. In a meeting with analysts at the LA Auto Show, Ghosn stresses Nissan's recent success with small cars and hints he may kill the slow-selling Titan truck. "The name of the game is going to be more fuel-efficient cars," he says. "And when you make your product plans for the future, you can't say, 'I've always had a pickup truck, so I'll just keep improving it.' If you can't make it profitably, you have to get out." Afterward, analyst Steve Usher of Japaninvest switches his neutral rating on Nissan to a buy. "He's back," says Usher. "But it's not the return of the conquering hero. He's got to deliver again."

There's still plenty of work to be done. Like Detroit, Ghosn is playing catch-up to Toyota in the green-car race. Even though he just launched a hybrid version of the Nissan Altima, Ghosn remains a skeptic of the high cost of gasoline-electric cars, which earn little or no profit. Ghosn's big bet is on a small electric car he promises to put on the road by 2011. "I'm convinced that for urban driving the answer will be the electric vehicle," he says. "With oil at $100 a barrel, there's a lot of interest in a zero-emission car." Unlike hybrids with their complicated dual motors, electric cars have greater profit potential because they run on a single propulsion system. Nissan is working with Japanese electronics maker NEC to develop a lithium ion battery that would allow a car to go 120km on a charge and juice up in an hour.

But that's not what you'll find in Ghosn's garage. These days, he's driving Nissan's new GT-R, the hot rod he introduced to wild adulation at the Los Angeles and Tokyo auto shows. The 480hp, $69,850 sports car goes from zero to 100kph in under four seconds—and guzzles plenty of gas along the way. Ghosn argues Nissan needs this "halo car" to attract buyers and boost its image. Still, he adds, getting back on message: "I am totally conscious of the fact that we have to bring cars that are much more environmentally friendly."

It's not an easy balancing act. And in a private moment, Ghosn admits the past year took a toll. "When your performance declines," he says, "the first thing you do is question yourself." Rather than retreat, Ghosn says he was emboldened to take risks. For example, he just formed an unusual alliance with a Bajaj, a motorcycle maker in India, to try to engineer a ultra-cheap $3,000 car for developing countries. Now that Nissan is rolling again, his rock-star swagger is returning. "Nissan is the biggest turnaround in the history of the car industry," he says of the company's 2000 revival. "Nothing and nobody is going to take it away from me."

The next day, Ghosn is back where he is happiest—onstage before an adoring audience. This time it's at Stanford University, and he's charming a packed auditorium of business students. He brings down the house when he explains his inability to woo reluctant GM. "Can you buy your wife?" he asks to howls of laughter. "You can't say, 'You have to live with me because I bought you.' Each person wants to feel enriched by their marriage." In the end, Ghosn gets a hero's ovation, but M.B.A. student Lydia Jett wonders about his staying power. "You can build yourself up to be a great man," she says. "But to be a star like Jack Welch, he has to deliver over the long term." That's why Ghosn is on the road again, trying to prove he's more than a one-hit wonder.

© 2007