Nissan 370Z successor skirts Europe, may go electric

Nissan has shared the latest news concerning its all-new sports car allegedly named 400Z, coming to succeed the iconic 370Z. We have good news and bad news.

The good news is that the car will most probably be getting an especially powerful special edition, whether from Nissan directly or its Nismo supercar subdivision. Hiroshi Tamura, head manager of Nissan Z and GT-R projects, hinted at this in an interview with an Australian newspaper. He added that the Z Proto Concept had originally been envisioned as a full-electric vehicle, but later reimagined as a classical one. The way things stand now, the battery car may see the daylight, too, but only if there is enough public interest in it. A roadster model may also make a comeback to the Z range.

Excited? Living in Europe? Here’s the hitch: the 400Z won’t be coming to Europe. The company cites ‘at least two’ reasons: declining demand and excessively strict environmental standards. You know.

It has been also made official now that the new car comes based on the same platform as the original 370Z, with appropriate modernizations in place. It uses a 3.0-liter V6 that outputs more thrust than the current 3.7-liter unit’s 337 horsepower (251 kW), but how much more remains unannounced. Rumors abound that the company aims for the 400 hp (298 kW) of the Infiniti Q60.

The last piece of news is that the name for the car has not been decided upon yet, despite the fact that it has apparently been in production since March 2017.

If we consider that the GT-R production car premiered two years after its Proto version, the alleged 400Z should emerge by late 2022.