Shanghai (ZXZC)- Dongfeng Infiniti's headquarters saw the number of employees decline to less than 240 from the peak level of 300, according to local media. Some departments, such as justice, after-sales service and public relations only remain a few employees with part of posts frozen after staff left. 

Dongfeng Infiniti could not be reached for comments in terms of the “layoff” issue when the report was prepared.   

It's been a decade since Infiniti stepped into China. In 2014, the Japanese premium car brand started to locally produce vehicles in the world largest auto market. However, it delivered less than 50,000 vehicles in China last year, dramatically trailing such so-called “second-tier” luxury car brands as Cadillac, Jaguar Land Rover and Volvo who saw their annual sales exceeding 100,000 units in this country.

For the first three quarters of this year, the sales of China-made and imported Infiniti branded cars in China totaled only around 30,000 units, which was far from the 2018 sales target of 100,000 units set in the initial period of product localization.

Infiniti's sales depression in China is closely related to the less competitiveness of products. Dongfeng Infiniti currently has only two models for sale—the Q50L and the QX50, while neither of them sees monthly sales reach 2,000 units.

Besides, the brand is suffering the channel trouble. There are a total of 123 dealers in China partnering with Infiniti, according to relevant data. Nevertheless, the automaker is gradually losing its dealers because the stagnant sales performance brings high pressure on the stock and operation cost for dealers.

The Japanese car brand did enjoy some prosperous time in China after it started to locally produce cars there. In December, 2015, Infiniti saw its sales in China jumped 26.8% year on year to 4,220 units, exceeding 4,000 units in monthly sales for the first time. During that year, the automaker sold a total of 40,188 vehicles in China with a remarkable year-on-year growth of 33.8%, accounting for nearly 20% of its global sales.

It is reported that Infiniti will launch its first production electric model until 2021 and has no roll-out plan for China-made models yet.