What do you think of Infiniti? – The cars, the brand and how significant the company will be to you in the future? Chances are, unless you’re based in the U.S, the response to either of these questions will be a dismissive shrug of the shoulders.
That’s the unfortunate problem in which Infiniti currently finds itself, even though Infiniti has been selling cars here in Europe since 2008 – the brand is defined by its US customer base who exhibit very different tastes to those of us in Europe.
In early-2006 Nissan’s President and CEO, Carlos Ghosn announced that Infiniti’s distinctive performance and luxury vehicles would be coming to Western Europe. But Two years later the global economic downturn hit and Infiniti’s big market launch was put on hold, with Ghosn’s plan to take on BMW, Mercedes, Audi and Jaguar becoming little more than a pipe dream.

Infiniti Centre Reading opened its doors in 2009, with the plan to increase the company’s UK footprint to include twelve centres by 2011. Instead, the brand has grown to include just ‘seven’ dealers, with the latest – Infiniti Centre Hull – opening last week.
So you’ll appreciate the significance of Infiniti’s new flag-bearer, the 414bhp 5.0-litre FX Vettel Edition, which began production in Tochigi, Japan last month.
The FX Vettel Edition is a unique collaboration between Sebastian Vettel and Infiniti’s Chief Creative Officer, Shiro Nakamura, and has just begun a Tour of the UK, where Infiniti hope to use the model to attract visitors to its official Infiniti Centres.
At a list price of £100,800, Infiniti are unlikely to discover any new customers for the car, but the curiosity of seeing Sebastian Vettel’s handiwork should be enough to draw people into the brand’s sumptuous new showrooms.
SkiddMark will be joining the tour later this week, travelling to one of the many after-parties in the latest FX30dS.
You can follow our journey via @InfinitiGB on Twitter and the Infiniti GB and Infiniti Europe Facebook pages and will be asking for your suggestions of interesting detours on our way from London to Manchester on Thursday 15th November.
During the journey we’ll be tweeting pictures and answering any questions about Infiniti, the roads you’d like us to travel on and of course whether we’ll make it to the FX Vettel After Party before all the food is gone.
# | Date | Infiniti Centre |
---|---|---|
1 | 8th November | Hull (opening ceremony) |
2 | 12th/13th November | Glasgow |
3 | 15th/16th November | Stockport |
4 | 19th/20th November | Leeds |
5 | 22nd/23rd November | Birmingham |
6 | 26th/27th November | Reading |
7 | 1st/2nd December (tbc) | London |
* * *
To Infiniti and beyond..
Even though Infiniti might seem ‘new’ to us, the company actually launched in the US in 1989 – the same year as its arch-rival, Lexus. Ghosn is aware of the progress made by his rivals, but remains determined to see Infiniti achieve its full potential.

The company’s Power 88 plan includes a disproportionate contribution from Infiniti – whereas the group aims to achieve “..a global market share of 8% and increase our corporate operating profit margin to a sustainable 8%”, the Infiniti brand is being held to achieving a 10% market share of the global luxury car market by 2016.
That’s one hell of a growth curve, representing around 100,000 cars at current volumes, and will see the number of Infiniti Centres in the UK grow from 7 to around 40 by 2016.
To achieve this, Infiniti will need to establish a few ‘halo models’ that generate discussion about its range of products and establish its peer-level among the other premium car makers.
Ghosn plans to eliminate product overlaps between his brands and widen the portfolio of Infiniti products on offer. In fact Infiniti is to become a leader among its luxury peers, leveraging its partnership with Mercedes-Benz for the supply of engines – especially diesel engines and the latest hybrid power train technologies.
Gallery
Written By

Steve Davies
Steve is an investor, private equity advisor and former Partner at KPMG, PwC and Bain. Most importantly he's a life-long car enthusiast, mountain biker and active sports enthusiast. He designs and builds technology platforms and is the architect behind Transmission.
Try These Next
Stories we think you'll enjoy
December 1, 2021
All I want for Christmas . . . Is an MG TD
A boy's first encounter with an MG TD turned into a dream drive for Steve Hindle as he finally got behind the wheel of a true British classic
April 18, 2016
Can-Am Spyder F3 Limited – First Ride (w/VIDEO)
On the face of it, a bike which doesn't lean, is too wide to weave through traffic and can't pull a wheelie sounds pretty pointless - like a solution…
January 26, 2016
Judgement Day for the Holy Trinity: McLaren P1 vs Porsche 918 Spyder vs LaFerrari (w/VIDEOS)
Three of the fastest hypercars on the planet tested side-by-side for the very first time - Steve Davies joins Supercar Driver to find out which is…
1 Comment
Add comment Cancel reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
There’s been quite a bit of flack fired at Infiniti for this
but I quite like what they’re doing. Of course this limited edition is
ridiculously expensive, but that’s part of the whole point; this car isn’t
designed for you or me or any average Joe, but what it does do is to bring
Infiniti, and their range of somewhat more affordable models into play as a
cool brand. How easy is it to sell the idea of buying a more basic FX to the other
half when you tell them that you’re saving £50k on the Vettel edition! And of
course, by limiting production, there’ll be no end to the queue of Premier
League hopefuls and their vajazzled sweethearts, wanting something useful for
the trip to the nail parlour.
So “good-on Infiniti” I say. When you’re competing against
the mighty Germans (Porsche, Audi, BMW, Mercedes), using their soon to be
triple F1 Champion as your salesman seems to be quite a good idea to me.