The man in charge of the R35 project was Kazutoshi Mizuno, who had joined Nissan in 1972. Initially he'd been involved on the design front, but moved across to the sports car development centre in 1987. He soon became the manager of the works racing team in the glorious Group C era, before being assigned to head the Skyline and Fairlady Z programmes in the new millennium. Then came a call to lead the new GT-R project as well. Not satisfied with modifying the Skyline coupe and giving it a GT-R badge (the traditional direction initially being taken by Koji Takahashi, with an advanced prototype purported to feature an engine breathed on by Cosworth and a Lotus-tuned suspension, up and running by the spring of 2003), Mizuno turned down the R35 job at first, but having received a green light that allowed him to press a reset button and develop the car he wanted, work began in earnest on the creation of an all-new GT-R at the end of 2003, with Takahashi acting as Mizuno's right-hand man. As it happens, according to people close to the project, development of the R35 had started in mid-2000. At one point the project was shelved for a few months, but duly revived again, with the result being the 2001 Concept. Indeed, things had already progressed to a point of testing at the Nürburgring, answering a lot of questions if nothing else, and one can also see hints of V35/V36-inspired engineering, so it's fair to say that a lot of the basics concerning the GT-R's chassis and powertrain were already in place before Mizuno officially accepted the position of the R35's CPS and CVE.

In truth, with Ghosn having mentioned the GT-R in the Nissan Revival Plan and having just promised the new car for 2007 in front of television cameras, everyone involved knew it was going to be a race against time - starting over from a clean sheet of paper was not a realistic option, even though it got awfully close to it by the time Mizuno had finished. Anyway, despite the days of the front-engine, rear-wheel drive (FR) sports car seemingly being numbered, Mizuno declared he didn't want to give up on the configuration entirely. With the top BMW sedans in his sights, it was the FR-L (or FM) platform that immediately sprang to mind, being familiar territory for Mizuno, as it was used on the V35 Skyline. Already heavily supported within the company, alongside this train of thought, the AWD format of the last three GT-R generations was kept on the table to allow the Japanese maker to punt a world-class supercar, better than anything it had released previously, and prompting older workers to recall the glamorous Nissan MID4 of the eighties. Aware of the pressing time constraints, with a lot of work being done behind the scenes even before Mizuno officially accepted the post, it didn't take long to confirm that a well-sorted AWD system improved all-round driving dynamics, and the enhanced traction also allowed the use of more power - something that was needed if a true supercar was to be created by contemporary standards. Long gone were the days when anything that could dismiss the 0-60 dash in under six seconds qualified for the hallowed 'supercar' moniker. Over the following months, the set-up was duly honed into the four-wheel drive PM package, with PM standing for Premium Midship - the latter term often being applied in Japan whenever a front-mounted powerplant is kept far back in the engine bay, and bears no relationship to a traditional midship (or MR) layout.