Nissan has stopped spending money on new gas powered engines

Nissan is giving up on the combustion engine once and for all.

The Japanese automaker said gas and diesel engine development is ‘done’, and there’s no going back.

From now on, it’ll be electric all the way.

READ MORE: Rimac Automobili CEO receives his customized $2.2M Rimac Nevera

This is more than just hyperbole, these are the actual words of Francois Bailly, Nissan Senior Vice-President for Africa, Middle East, India, Europe and Oceania, the region that’s known in the industry as AMIEO.

Speaking to Drive.com.au, Bailly said the company’s future is EV.

“We’re not investing in new powertrain for internal combustion engines, that’s for sure,” Bailly said.

Crucially, he also said something else that highlights the key issue with EVs.

“Each market will go at their own pace,” Bailly added.

This is true, and it’s also a point of contention.

What are other automakers doing?

Nissan isn’t going to be developing new gas engines anymore but, just next door in Japan, we’ve got Subaru, Toyota, and Mazda announcing a new upcoming internal combustion engine.

Then there’s the example that’s being set by Rimac.

When Mate Rimac, founder of the electric hypercar brand from Croatia, took over as Bugatti CEO, he made it clear that the next Chiron wasn’t going to be electric.

A couple of years later, he proved it by unveiling the new V16 that’s going to power the Chiron successor.

And he’s taking it one step further now because he’s apparently thinking about using Rimac, his own EV brand, to make gas-powered hypercars.

Speaking at the FT ‘Future of the Car‘ conference in London, Mate Rimac couldn’t have been more honest and clear about this.

“Rimac isn’t exclusively electric, it’s [about] doing whatever is most exciting at the time,” he said.

He added that some automakers are ‘pushing stuff on us that we don’t want’ and he drew a comparison with the Apple Watch.

“An Apple Watch can do everything better [than an analog timepiece]. But nobody would pay $200,000 for an Apple Watch,” Rimac said.

This is a valid point that’s proven on a weekly basis, as not a week goes by without a record sale.

It was Sylvester Stallone’s watches this week, and it was a record-breaking Rolex last week.

The only thing we know for sure is it isn’t going to be a record-breaking Apple watch next week.