TodayApril 16, 2022

Shiro Nakamura, future product

Shiro Nakamura is really the senior vice president for the Nissan design division, but this night we are having a bit of fun.

Shiro, as usual, gives a speech about design and what the future holds for Nissan and Infiniti. At the end he teases us with two shadows of future cars; the white one for Nissan, the red for Infiniti.

A colleague, and friend, came up afterward and said they thought the Nissan future car was a 350Z roadster and the red shadow car was a version of an Infiniti GT-R. We all got on a bus together to go to dinner. When I got on the bus Shiro was sitting by himself, so I sat down next to him. I’ve interviewed Shiro often enough that he knows me and we have a good fun relationship.

The bus is a bit noisy, so I wrote the two names down that my friend had said and I asked Shiro if those were the cars. Shiro said no, it was not a 350Z roadster, but a 350Z coupe. Then I pointed to the Infiniti and he shoke his head no, scratched out the GT-R and wrote, “new form”.

We get off the bus and sat down for dinner and my friend said, “so, did he tell you what it was?” Well, of course, I had to play with him. “he told me, but he told me I couldn’t tell anyone”. My friend gave me a hard time the rest of the night.

The clincher came when dinner was over and I took the menu over to Shiro and asked him if he would do me a favor. He did. Below is the picture of the car Shiro drew and then wrote, “don’t tell anyone!”, Shiro.

I can still hear my friend, and colleague, yelling, “No way”.

So, what do you think the red Infiniti is? Watch the video and tell me.

Share
Lou Ann Hammond

Lou Ann Hammond is the CEO of Carlist and Driving the Nation. She is the co-host of Real Wheels Washington Post carchat every Friday morning and is the Automotive, energy correspondent for The John Batchelor Show and a Contributor to Automotive Electronics magazine headquartered in Korea. Hammond is a founding member of the Women's World Car of the Year #WWCOTY, and board member of the Women in Automotive.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.