Renault SA and Nissan Motor Corp. are appointing advisers for their talks about expanding their alliance to include U.S. carmaker General Motors Corp. (NYSE:GM), the chief executive of both Renault and Nissan said Wednesday.

The CEO, Carlos Ghosn, had said last week that talks with GM chief executive Rick Wagoner were progressing well in a ``positive'' atmosphere but had declined to give further details.

Separately on Wednesday, a Renault spokeswoman said the French carmaker is looking for two investment banks to advise on the merits of a possible alliance with GM.

``We're currently in the process of selecting the advisory banks for our discussions with GM,'' Renault spokeswoman Nathalie Bourotte said.

Bourotte declined to comment on a report in the Financial Times newspaper that the company has already picked BNP Paribas _ where Renault chairman Louis Schweitzer has a seat on the board _ as one of its advisers.

Ghosn and Wagoner began exploratory discussions in July after key GM shareholder Kirk Kerkorian suggested that the Detroit-based carmaker should enter an alliance with Renault-Nissan.

Ghosn has set a preliminary mid-October deadline for a decision on whether adding GM to their alliance would be in the interests of Renault and Nissan, which is based in Japan.