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Published on November 21, 2007

The Navara Black Star Limited, produced in limited numbers, comes with a canopy in the rear covering the bed. The other model, the Navara XE, is aimed at customers using the Navara for commercial purposes.

"This year, the first 10 months of sales for Nissan was 18.5-per-cent higher than the same period last year," said Siam Nissan Automobile president Thierry Viadieu. "This happened during a market slump of 5.7 per cent. It shows how good a product the Navara pickup is. We are now No 3 in pickup sales, as opposed to No 4 last year."

Total sales for Nissan in the first 10 months was 31,624 units for a market share of 6.2 per cent, up from 5.7 per cent in the same period last year. The Navara posted growth of 34 per cent, while the pickup market was down 9.5 per cent. The market share for the Nissan Navara in the pickup segment was 9 per cent.

At the launch of the two vehicles, Nissan also announced Thailand was now a global production and assembly hub for Nissan. The Navara pickup will be exported to 120 markets worldwide from the Kingdom. In fiscal 2007 ending next April 30, 30,000 units of the Navara will have been exported, up from only 3,000 units in the same period last year. Besides Thailand, the Navara is currently produced in the US and Europe.

The current production capacity of the plant on Bang Na-Trat Road is 140,000 units, of which only 85,000 are now being produced. Viadieu said it would take until 2009 to reach full production capacity. The capacity can be further boosted to 180,000 units if three shifts are run instead of the present two shifts.

Vijo Varghese

 The Nation