Photo/Illutration Nissan Motor Co. and Honda Motor Co. (Asahi Shimbun file photos)

The management integration talks between Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. could be terminated as the automakers keep failing to reach common ground, several sources said on Feb. 4.

Both companies will soon hold board meetings to discuss whether to continue pursuing the plan, according to the sources.

Honda, Japan’s second-largest automaker, frustrated by the slow progress in the talks, recently proposed making Nissan a subsidiary. However, Nissan, the third largest, strongly opposed the suggestion.

When the integration plan was announced at a joint news conference in December last year, the two companies said they would establish a holding company possibly in August and put both automakers under its umbrella.

They also initially said they would make a decision by the end of January on whether to go ahead with the integration.

However, struggling Nissan delayed establishing its restructuring plan, and the decision on integration was postponed to mid-February.

Last year, Nissan said it would cut 9,000 jobs worldwide. But the company did not explain the plan to its potential business partner, and Honda officials complained that Nissan is too slow, the sources said.

At the joint news conference in December, Nissan President Makoto Uchida emphasized that both companies would be on an equal footing.

“It is not about which company is dominant over the other,” Uchida said.

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