Yes, Nissan licenses a technology called Plasma Transferred Wire Arc which was patented by Ford to build the engines. It replaces traditional cylinder sleeves with a coating of iron and iron oxide. The GT-R is the first car to use it in production and the 2011 GT500 is the second.

If you really dig, there is a LOT of sharing. Whether it be direct from manufacturer to manufacturer like in this case, or through a common supplier like in others.

I know. I'm actually rather surprised by all the sharing going on. I wonder why a car company would help a competitor out by sharing its technology. I doubt they would make that much profit from the licensing agreement.

I'm sure a lot of it is economies of scale, especially in the case of joint platform projects like we've seen from Subaru/Toyota, GM/Toyota, Ford/Mazda.

Plus, if you can play off of the expertise of competitors and work together through a combination of competition and cooperation (let's call it "coopetition") you help ensure the viability of the industry because you both working in a collective and competitive fashion to build a better product.

I'm sure in the case of the GT-R Nissan engineers shared their real-world experience with Ford as part of the licensing agreement... and what do you know... Ford decides 2011 was the right time to apply it to the Mustang. Both manufacturers win and in the end the consumer wins.

:tup:

If you think about it most industries are like that. In investment management I share a lot of knowledge and ideas with competitors. It makes us better and in the end our clients win.

When you think about it, they don't really lose anything either. There's not a lot of people choosing the gtr over the gt500 because of the technique used on the cylinder walls...not to mention Nissan subsidizing r&d costs is always a huge benefit.