By Anthony Henson, July 1, 2025
Nissan Motor Co., once a symbol of post-war industrial resurgence, now clutches at financial straws as it spirals deeper into crisis. In a revealing display of corporate desperation, the automaker has quietly urged suppliers across Britain and the European Union to accept delayed payments—an effort to conjure short-term liquidity in the face of long-term decay. Leaked internal emails and documents expose a company hollowed out by years of mismanagement and the cruel arithmetic of technological stagnation.
At the helm is new CEO Ivan Espinosa, who took power in April amid the wreckage of a $4.5 billion annual loss. His answer to the crisis is familiar and brutal: a culling of 15% of the global workforce and the shuttering of seven plants.
Espinosa’s plan, cloaked in the language of efficiency and turnaround, is in truth a dismantling—an admission that the company’s ageing vehicle lineup and faltering sales can no longer support the weight of its own infrastructure.
The supplier payment delays, though dressed up in corporate euphemism—”flexible terms” and “supporting free cash flow”—are merely another extraction. Suppliers are offered a false choice: be paid later, with interest, or take what little cash remains now.
The internal correspondence, shared among Nissan’s purchasing and treasury staff, makes clear this directive came from the highest echelons, despite official denials. It is the logic of a dying empire: conserve cash by passing the burden downward.
This is not just the story of a struggling automaker. It is the slow unravelling of a system built on the illusion of perpetual growth. Nissan, like so many institutions before it, has become a case study in late-stage capitalism, where short-term survival trumps long-term vision, and human labour is just another line item to be slashed.