The price of admission to the auto industry's top tier has just gone up. Exhibit One: Nissan's quadriennial 360 event, the latest edition of which concludes this month in Newport Beach, Calif. By the time it is over, more than 900 international journalists from Asia, Europe, and the Americas will be transported to the West Coast to drive some 125 new models and test vehicles on five tracks and off-road courses specially constructed for the occasion at a nearby abandoned Marine airfield. When not behind the wheel, Nissan's guests are socializing with company executives at the lush Pelican Hill resort overlooking the Pacific. Insiders report that American journalists ask the most questions, Europeans consume the most beverages, and the Chinese damage the most cars.

    The bill for this kind of extravaganza is steep. When everything from travel to hotels to the actual costs of staging the event (buildings, cars, technology displays, and so on) is included, the total cost of the event will run about $10,000 per guest -- some $9 million in all. But as one executive explained, "When you spend billions on R&D, investing a few dollars more to show off the hardware makes good sense."

    Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn was scheduled to attend a 360 session at the end of August but became a no-show when he had to tamp down an uprising in his executive ranks. One of his protégés, Carlos Tavares, the chief operating officer of Nissan's partner Renault, had seen himself succeeding Ghosn as head of the Nissan-Renault alliance But when it became apparent that Ghosn, 59, wasn't going anywhere, Tavares, 55, made his impatience publicly known by announcing to a Bloomberg reporter that he was making himself a candidate for the CEO job at General Motors (GM, Fortune 500) or Ford (F, Fortune 500) instead. Two weeks later, Tavares was out of his job at Renault

    With Ghosn absent, the biggest attraction at Nissan 360 was not the GT-R supercar known as "Godzilla" or the van-like "taxi of tomorrow" soon to venture onto New York streets as the city's official yellow cab, or even any of the 37 historic and concept cars on display. Rather it was a homely Nissan Leaf outfitted with lasers, radar, sensors, and cameras that is Nissan's down payment on its pledge to develop the first production-capable autonomous vehicle: a car that drives itself.

    As I learned on a test ride, "semi autonomous" is a more accurate description since the driver's seat must still be occupied by someone who has his eyes on the road and can take control in an emergency. A driver is also required in congested urban situations where the jumble of images would overwhelm the capacities of its electronic eyes and software algorithms. But as I watched from the back seat, the battery-powered Leaf overtook and passed a slower vehicle, exited a highway, and swerved around a pedestrian without any guidance from the driver beyond the activation of a turn signal.

    Ghosn loves precise targets almost as much as he loves results, and he promises to have a semi-autonomous car ready to sell by 2020. Looming larger than the technical challenges are the regulatory and insurance issues that need to be solved by then, along with the adoption of common-sense behavioral issues. Does the ability of a car to drive itself mean that the person behind the wheel can text more intently or drink more heavily? And who pays the bills if a mishap befalls him as he does? 

    想让业界公认你是业内一线厂商的代价又提高了。比如本月日产公司（Nissan）在加州的纽波特海滩连续第四年迎来了它的“360”试驾活动，来自亚洲、欧洲和美洲的900多名记者云集西海岸，在五条赛道和越野路线上对125辆车进行了试驾评测。值得一提的是，这些路线是日产公司专门为了本次活动而在一个废弃军用场附近修建的。其余的时间记者们将在风景如画、能俯瞰太平洋的鹈鹕山度假村里与公司高管进行交流。内部人士称，美国记者问的问题最多，欧洲记者喝的饮料最多，而中国记者弄坏的汽车最多。

    举办这样奢华的活动，费用之高也可想而知。如果把差旅费、酒店费和场地费、用车成本、技术展示费用等各种费用都计算在内，那么这场活动的总成本可能高达900万美元，也就是平均每名客人1万美元。不过就像日产公司的一名高管解释的那样：“既然已经投了几十亿在研发上，再花一点钱展示一下硬件，也完全合情合理。”

    日产公司CEO卡洛斯•高森本来计划参加在八月底参加本次活动的一个环节，但由于公司高层闹起了内讧需要他亲自弹压，因而只能遗憾缺席。原因是雷诺公司（Renault）的首席运营官卡洛斯•塔瓦雷斯此前认为他接替高森成为雷诺—日产联盟的新老板已经是板上钉钉的事，但是现在大家都看出今年59岁的高森并没有任何退休或放权的迹象。因此55岁的塔瓦雷斯按捺不住心中的不快，公开对彭博社（Bloomberg）一位记者宣布，他将参与竞争通用汽车（General Motors）或福特（Ford ）的下一任CEO职位。两周后，塔瓦雷斯就从雷诺离职了。

    在高森缺席的情况下，本次日产360活动中最吸引人眼球的并不是有“怪兽哥斯拉”之称的GT-R超跑，也不是长得像面包车一样并且即将正式加入纽约黄色出租车队伍的“明日出租车”，甚至也不是参展的37辆老爷车和概念车里的任何一辆，而是一辆装配了各种激光、雷达、传感器和摄相头的日产聆风（Leaf）电动车，它也是日产公司为了践行开发量产级自动驾驶汽车的承诺而走出的第一步。

    不过根据我从试驾中了解的情况，“半自动”或许是对它更好的描述。因为这辆车的驾驶座上必须坐着一个看路况的人，以便在紧急情况下可以保持对车辆的控制。另外在拥挤的城市环境中也需要驾驶员的操控，因为这辆车的电子眼和软件算法尚无法承受过于海量的图像。不过我从后排座位上看到，在没有司机指令的情况下，这辆聆风电动车自己打了转向灯，超过了一辆开得稍慢的车，在高速上表现得很好，而且还绕过了一名行人。

    精确的目标和最终的成果都是卡洛斯•高森非常看重的东西。他承诺在2020年前将推出量产级的半自动化轿车。不过届时比起技术上的挑战，法律和保险方面的新问题可能是更亟待解决的，此外还有老百姓的某些行为引发的问题。比如如果汽车实现了自动驾驶，是不是意味着坐在方向盘后头的那个人就算是发发短信或是开车前喝点小酒也没关系了？如果他遭遇了车祸，或者他的车制造了车祸，谁该来为他买单？    

    The real payoff from self-driving cars lies further in the future. Traffic will move more smoothly, fuel will be consumed more economically, and accidents will occur less often, leading to a day when side panel safety beams can be removed and airbags become obsolete. Ghosn foresees a day when autonomous cars are responsible not only for zero emissions but also zero fatalities.

    Still, Nissan is taking the plunge into AVs at a time when its bet on EVs -- electric vehicles --has yet to pay off in acceptance or sales. The company has sold 30,000 battery-powered Leafs in the U.S since they were introduced in December 2010 but has the capacity to manufacture several times that number at its plant in Tennessee. Customer response has been restrained by range anxiety, the uncertainly that arises out of fear that the battery will discharge before the destination is reached. Despite cutting Leaf prices $6,400 at the beginning of the year, Nissan had sold just 11,703 in through July.

    If they are fazed by the Leaf's slow sales, Nissan executives aren't showing it, and they claim the car has helped lift Nissan's image with customers in a way that is reflected in higher transaction prices. In 2009, the company commissioned a McKinsey study that measured the revenue gap between Nissan and best-in-class vehicles across different segments and markets. It found that lower transaction prices were costing Nissan $6 billion annually. Over the past four years, Nissan has narrowed that gap by around $4 billion with new products, an enhanced dealer network, and advanced technology like the Leaf.

    Going forward, Nissan hopes to further rid itself of the "discount brand" label by using identifiable design executions consistently across its product lines. Today, you wouldn't think that the elegant Altima sedan shared parentage with the awkward Murano convertible or the truly bizarre Juke crossover. That's going to change as Nissan creates thematic similarities among models, and it released an impressionistic sketch of the 2015 Maxima with coupe-like styling to prove its point.

    Besides design, Nissan executives believe there are numerous opportunities to boost sales in the U.S. after what they concede are five years of disappointing performance. Two obvious subjects: the Sentra, a homely compact that sells at less than half the rate of Honda Civic, the segment leader; and the Titan full-size pickup, which was introduced with great fanfare in 2004 but is still little more than an afterthought for truck buyers. Improvement in all areas is essential if Nissan is to reach its goal of attaining 10% of the U.S. market. It currently stands at 8%, leaving it in seventh place beyond the Detroit Three,Toyota (TM), Honda (HMC), and Hyundai/Kia. Nissan believes its 10% goal is reachable within the next several years, given its current rate of growth and product cadence.

    Globally Nissan finished fiscal year 2012 with a 6.2% share of a 79.3 million unit global market, and Ghosn pledges to reach 8% market share (and 8% return on sales) by the end of fiscal year 2016 on March 31, 2017. A big part of the push will come from a new emphasis on marketing. For instance, Nissan put in place a global advertising campaign for the Nissan GT-R, leveraging a collaboration with Olympic sprinter Usain Bolt. This campaign appears in dozens of international airports around the world, so when you depart from Hong Kong and arrive in London, the GT-R advertisement you see from Nissan is identical. It has also taken to engaging in big ticket marketing programs -- like Infiniti's entry in Formula One and its sponsorship of the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio -- to better raise Nissan's visibility in key markets around the world.

    Says one executive: "As we've expanded from a company that sold 2 million vehicles a year in 1999 when we formed the alliance with Renault, to one that now sells nearly 5 million vehicles, we haven't always increased our marketing resource to stay in step with our sales. Now we're doing this" -- as 900 international journalists experienced first-hand by driving 124 cars and riding in one.

    自动驾驶汽车所带来的好处还体现在将来。到时候交通会变得更加顺畅，燃油经济性进一步提高，交通事故不再频发。总有一天，汽车将不再需要防撞钢梁和安全气囊。卡洛斯•高森认为，总有一天，自动驾驶汽车不仅能实现零排放，还能实现车祸零死亡。

    虽然日产公司的电动汽车迄今尚未在认可度和销量上取得丰收，但日产还是义无反顾地跳到了自动驾驶汽车的研发上。自从该公司于2010年12月推出聆风电动汽车以来，这款电池动力车型在美国已经售出了30000辆，但是日产设在田纳西州的工厂拥有超过这个数字好几倍的生产能力。消费者表示经常因为“里程焦虑症”感到头痛，也就是担心车还没有开到地方，电池就已经没电了。虽然今年年初聆风的车价下调了6400美元，但是直到七月底，这款车只在美国卖出了11703台。

    虽然聆风的惨淡销量可能让日产高管觉得不安，但他们并没有流露出来。而且他们表示，聆风对提升日产公司的形象起了积极作用，这一点可以通过交易价格的提升反映出来。2009年，日产公司发布了麦肯锡公司（McKinsey）的一份调查报告，把日产的车型在各个细分市场和地区市场上的交易价格与同级别表现最佳的车型做了对比。结果发现，由于日产公司各车型的价格比后者更低，导致日产公司每年要损失60亿美元。但是在过去四年里，日产通过推出新产品、做大做强经销商网络以及推出聆风等先进技术，已经把这个差距缩小到了40亿美元。

    日产公司希望通过继续在全系产品中使用具有可辨识度的设计语言，进一步摘掉“折扣品牌”的帽子。今天你大概不会想到，外型典雅美观的中级轿车天籁与难看的楼兰敞篷车和诡异的Juke跨界车系出同门。下一步，日产还在各款产品塑造相像的家族式外观，最近日产公布的2015款Maxima设计草图中的轿跑式外观就证明了这一点。

    日产高管也承认最近五年公司在美国市场上的表现令人失望。但是他们相信，除了设计之外，公司还有很多促进美国市场销量的机会。比如美版轩逸Sentra在美国的售价还不到紧凑型市场冠军本田（Honda）思域的一半。另外日产2004年引入美国的全尺寸皮卡Titan虽然在当年引起了轰动，但现在基本上已经不入购者车的法眼。如果日产要实现在美国市场10%的占有率目标，就必须要在所有领域都进行改进。目前日产只占据了8%的美国市场，落后于底特律三巨头、丰田（Toyota ）、本田和现代/起亚（Hyundai/Kia），排名第七位。日产公司相信，从现在的增长率和产品节奏来看，未来几年内是可以实现10%的目标的。

    2012年财年，日产在全球市场共卖出7930万辆汽车，占据了全球市场6.2%的份额。卡洛斯•高森声称，到2016财年结束时（也就是2017年3月31日），公司在全球市场上的份额将达到8%（销售利润也将达到8%），其中一个重要的推力是营销。比如最近日产公司聘请了奥运短跑冠军博尔特为GT-R跑车做全球代言。这个广告在全球几十个机场都能看到，也就是说如果你从香港起飞到伦敦，你在两地机场看到的GT-R广告是一样的。另外日产也开始在大型赛会上投放广告，比如英菲尼迪进入F1方程式、日产赞助2016年里约奥运会等，这一切都是为了提高日产在全球主要市场上的曝光度。

    日产的一位高管说：“从我们1999年刚与雷诺结盟时每年只能卖200万辆汽车，到现在年均销售近500万辆。在这个过程中，我们没有一直扩大营销资源以与销量保持同步，但现在我们正在做这件事。”而这次重金邀请900名国内外记者亲手试驾124辆汽车（以及试乘一辆自动驾驶汽车）就是一个典型的例子。（财富中文网）

    译者：朴成奎