Nissan has announced that its Kicks Concept has been given the green light for regular production. Introduced at the 2014 Sao Paulo Motor Show, the production version of the concept, which will retain the Kicks name, will begin rolling off the assembly line by year’s end.
Sales of the Kicks will initially kick off in Latin America, but Nissan says the crossover will eventually be sold globally. However, Nissan hasn’t indicated if the United States will be among the Kicks’ global markets.
“Nissan invented the first crossover in 2003, with the Murano,” said Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Nissan. “Since then, we’ve established our global crossover leadership with vehicles like JUKE, Qashqai and X-Trail – which have been great successes. The Kicks will bring Nissan´s unique Crossover expertise to more regions.”
The Kicks will be produced at Nissan’s Resende Industrial Complex in Rio de Janeiro State. Nissan plans to invest $192 million into the facility before Kicks production.
Nissan has not shown a production version of the Kicks, but the crossover will likely retain most of the styling cues of its concept counterpart. The show car version of the Kicks featured styling cues from the current Juke, but stretched slightly longer than the Juke.
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