With the expansion, Nissan is making Argentina a key component of its regional strategy eventually to position itself among the Top 3 brands in Latin America. With a presence spanning 38 countries, Nissan stated its commitment to becoming a core member of the Argentinean automotive industry, a market expected to reach one million in sales in the mid-term.

The global Renault-Nissan Alliance will serve as a tool to kick-off Nissan’s manufacturing operations in the country. With the investment of US$600 million, the company will build pick-up trucks in Renault’s industrial complex in Córdoba on a dedicated pick-up assembly line. Along with Nissan’s new truck, the new line also will produce a 1-ton pick-up truck for Renault and a new pick-up for Mercedes, stemming from a Daimler-Renault-Nissan Alliance cooperation agreement. (Earlier post.) The pick-ups will share some common architecture but will have markedly different brand design and attributes, distinctive of each brand.

The new assembly line will be capable of producing 70,000 pick-ups per year. This production line alone, will generate approximately 1,000 direct jobs, and another 2,000 indirect. The first vehicle to be assembled will be the all-new NP300 Frontier by 2018. With this step, Argentina joins a network of global production sites for the NP300 Frontier that includes plants in Thailand, Mexico and soon Spain.

The Argentinean public will first see live the all-new NP300 Frontier during the Buenos Aires Auto Show of June 2015. The NP300 Frontier will be launched and sold in Argentina toward the end of 2015, initially imported from México. Production is expected to begin in Argentina by 2018, once local resources are ready.

Nissan sells more than 300,000 trucks each year and is a leader in the 1-ton truck segment, with more than 14 million units sold worldwide.

Nissan NP300 Frontier is the 12^th generation pick-up for Nissan and the 8^th generation pick-up to be launched in Latin America.

Nissan Latin America is a corporate region created in January 2014 to accelerate business growth through specific strategies designed to benefit regional consumers. Nissan LATAM spans 38 countries and two business units: Nissan do Brasil and Nissan Latinoamérica & el Caribe (NLAC). The company has wholly owned-subsidiaries in Brazil, Chile (Jan. 2015) and soon in Argentina, as well as National Sales Companies in other markets. In 2014, Nissan opened a new car manufacturing plant in Resende, Brazil, a Parts and Distribution Center and a Design Studio in Rio de Janeiro.