Infiniti M35h a ‘Great Drive’. Really?

Infiniti are bizarrely targeting Lexus hybrids with the M35h, instead of hitting the soft Lexus underbelly with quality performance cars.

Infiniti, in case you don’t know, is to Nissan what Lexus is to Toyota. The posh badge for a Japanese mass manufacturer.

Unlike Lexus, Infinitis are only sold outside Japan. Infiniti also plays second fiddle to Lexus in every market that counts. Certainly in the US and Europe they lag far behind Lexus. So we imagine their task in life is to haul in the advantage and become top dog.

And we’re told Infiniti are having a big push in the UK and Europe. Except we see no real evidence. In fact we were so surprised to come across an Infiniti FX 30d the other day it was even newsworthy.

What we believe Infiniti should be doing is filling in the performance hole left by the Lexus departure to hybrid land. There must be a big section of Lexus traditional owners who aren’t convinced by hybrid powertrains and CVT boxes. A chink in the Lexus armour, we would suggest.

Instead, Infiniti seem intent on pushing their hybrids. And not just here, but in the US too. In fact, they’ve produced the advert below for the Infinit M35h in the States, which is aimed directly at the GS 450h.

Now we’re not the biggest fans of hybrids. But the when we reviewed the Lexus GS 450h recently we were rather taken with the performance. True, it’s no M5, but it has a very good turn of speed and, despite a slight feeling of lardiness in the bends, it’s a fine car.

And the Infiniti M35h may well be too. But we find it hard to believe that it will be significantly better than the GS 450, which it would need to be to make inroads. Why take aim at a target that you have little chance of hitting? You just look daft.

We could ask Infiniti why they’re targeting Lexus hybrids instead of hitting the soft underbelly on Lexus by producing proper sporting saloons and crossovers.

But they wouldn’t have the good manners to respond.

Infiniti M35h Advert