Who’s Where: Taisuke Nakamura promoted as Karim Habib leaves Infiniti

Infiniti has confirmed, in an official statement, that Taisuke Nakamura – currently Infiniti program design director and a 26-year veteran of Nissan design – will rise to the role as head of Infiniti design, reporting to senior VP of Nissan global design Alfonso Albaisa. In the official statement, Albaisa confirmed: “Taisuke Nakamura, previously reporting to Karim as Infiniti program design director will step into a new global leadership role reporting to me as head of design for Infiniti, where he will continue to shape the brand’s electrified journey.” He will assume his new role from 1^st September.

Nakamura joined Nissan in 1993 after graduating from Kyoto City University of Arts with a BA in Product Design (and a post-grad at the RCA). He has since worked on a variety of Nissan and Infiniti projects, including a stint at Nissan Design Europe in London as a design manager. During his time at NDE (2011-2015) Taisuke spearheaded the creation of Nissan Concept 2020 Vision Gran Turismo. After returning to Nissan Global design in Atsugi in 2015 he managed the Nissan IMx concept and the Sylphy/Sentra design development. More recently he has been program design director of Infiniti EV concepts such as the QX Inspiration, Prototype 10 and Qs Inspiration.

Following its launch, Nakamura spoke about the design of the QX Inspiration, stating that one of the key highlights of the concept car is the interior design. The QX Inspiration interior has many high tech solutions, but the team set out to simplify the expression of very complicated technology, to create a more comfortable interior environment. This approach resonates through all the Infiniti Q concepts we have seen in the last few years, and hints at what we can expect from electric production Infinitis.

Nakamura’s promotion comes in the wake of Karim Habib announcing online that he is vacating the position, via to a statement on his Instagram account. His will have been a surprisingly short tenure at the brand, having only directed Infiniti design since 2017 after moving from BMW.

The statement reads:

“Over the last two years, I have been blessed to work with a team of very talented, deeply passionate and truly generous designers, modellers, engineers, product planners, public relations masters, marketing specialists and other team members. Together and with the guidance of Alfonso and his unwavering vision to create a Japanese design identity for Nissan and Infiniti, we managed to re-think what Infiniti should mean in an electric and autonomous future.”

Car Design News will be talking to Taisuke Nakamura at the Tokyo motor show about his new job and future plans in October.