CJ Lancer set for a decade

The current generation Mitsubishi Lancer small car is headed for a decade on sale in Australia with a substantial facelift due before the end of 2015.

The CJ Lancer launched here in September 2007 and has since been through at least six updates.

Over the same period Mazda has sold three different generations of its hugely successful 3 small car.

As has been chronicled several times by motoring.com.au, most recently last week, Mitsubishi Motors Corporation is struggling to find a partner to develop a new range of passenger cars with.

A relationship with Nissan-Renault seems to have collapsed, while there are also talks of a direct deal with Nissan.

Mitsubishi needs to share development load and an architecture because it is devoting the majority of its resources to SUVs, light commercials and green vehicles.

It launched a significant Outlander update in Australia last week and launches the new generation Triton this week, an all-new Challenger within 12 months, an all-new ASX in 2016 and further out, the next generation Pajero large SUV.

Mitsubishi Australia marketing boss Tony Principe admitted only limited amounts were known locally about its parents' longer term passenger car plans, but he did confirm the facelift was coming for Lancer before the end of the year and that the Mirage mini-car would be updated early in 2016.

"We don't actually know about any of that stuff, nor would we expect to. They are not going to tell us, they are quite high-level discussions.

"Our information is there is still a lot more water to go under the bridge, there is still a lot of activity going on but we are not really told exactly what it is."

It is expected the update will incorporate elements of the new 'Dynamic Shield' corporate face introduced with the Outlander update.

"Our focus at this stage is we have another facelift of the Lancer coming later this year," Principe told motoring.com.au. "We haven't been able to narrow them down on exact specifics but they are telling us it is a significant change.

"Mirage is the same thing. We haven't been able to narrow them down on exact specifics, we think it is more likely for early next year."

Principe determinedly insisted Mitsubishi Australia could still extract life from the Lancer, which sold 10,033 examples in 2014 and accounted for 4.3 per cent of the country's largest new vehicle segment.

"In terms of the market segment we are in, it is a pretty big segment," he said.

"It is still a five star [ANCAP] vehicle, it is still well priced so we can still generate a reasonable volume. It is holding its own.

"The reality is we are hanging in there at 750 to 800 [sales] a month and the reality is we are happy with that. That's what we can get out of Japan; the reality is their production capacity is pretty much going towards SUV and LCV anyway."

The current Lancer line-up kicks off at a bargain basement $18,990 (manufacturers list price) for the five-speed manual 2.0 ES sedan and climbs through the LS, GSR (the only hatchback left in the range) to the $28,490 auto version of the 2.4-litre XLS. The high-performance Evo is about to be discontinued.

Principe made the point Mitsubishi sales in Australia were holding up despite its aging passenger car range as buyers shifted to SUVs. And he defended the parent company's development priorities.

"We cannot be all things to all people and that's how we become successful, by narrowing our focus, trying to concentrate on our strong points and basically cut our costs, cut our overheads. We are putting all our resources to our strongest suits."