Isuzu May Return to Passenger Cars if They Find a Partner

For those who may not remember, there was once a time when Isuzu was into passenger cars. They made the Piazza and the Gemini, although neither model survived the crashing of the Japanese economy and Isuzu was forced to streamline their product range. For the last few decades they've focused on products with long product lifecycles, which helps to keep development costs low, and that has limited them to trucks, pickup trucks, and their derivatives. 

Go Auto had a chance to speak to Isuzu during the Australian launch of their updated MU-X and D-Max, the bread and butter of the Isuzu range, and executives within the company have said that they are looking to a passenger car comeback. More exciting is the fact that it may be based off of the Mazda MX-5 roadster, given the company's strong ties with Mazda. Naturally they are averse to products with a short lifespan, but this could be an interesting way for the company to diversify. 

So far it seems that Mazda is happy to play ball when it comes to rebranding their perennial roadster, with Fiat already having their own version in the form of the 124 Spider. If anything, an Isuzu model would be a revival of their early Piazza, which was an exciting little rear-wheel drive coupe. As they don't exactly have many small displacement powerplants in their portfolio, an MX-5 rebadging exercise would likely involve taking the powertrain as well, along with the entire dynamics package given that Isuzu hasn't had much recent experience with sports cars.