Who's where
John Sahs joins Mitsubishi
Following the closure of Nissan's latin America design studio, the designer has moved to Japan for a new role with Mitsubishi
Former head of Nissan's Latin America design studio John Sahs has joined Mitsubishi Motors as program design director, starting officially as of this month.
Moving from Sao Paulo, he is now on site in Nagoya, Japan at Mitsubishi's global design headquarters and will work under design general manager Seiji Watanabe. Details are thin for now, but we understand Sahs will be leading the "strategic design development of both exterior and interior design programmes."
"[I'm] looking forward to the amazing things we will do," said Sahs in a statement, adding that he is excited to be part of the brand's "journey in creating and designing the next generation of amazing cars for the future."
An ArtCenter graduate, Sahs started his career with internships at Ford, Daimler Chrysler and indeed Mitsubishi at its Cypress, California spot, specialising in exterior design at the time. He would alaso go on to work in Japan for much of his early years as a professional designer, joining Mercedes in Yokohama as an exterior-interior designer between 1993 and 2000.
He would go on to join Nissan that year and remain with the company in various positions before moving to Brazil in 2018 to lead the brand's new Sao Paulo studio; it was confirmed in September 2025 that this and the design centre in California would close as part of a scale-back in operations.
