NISSAN LCV UNIT A YEAR AHEAD OF SCHEDULE ON COMMITMENTS - -Sales, operating profit margin targets to be met in FY06--

Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., recently announced that it expects its light commercial vehicle (LCV) unit to meet its business commitments under the Nissan Value-Up plan in fiscal year 2006, a year ahead of schedule.
Under the three-year Nissan Value-Up plan which ends in fiscal year 2007, the unit committed to sales of 434,000 units, up 40% compared with fiscal year 2004. It also committed to doubling its consolidated operating profit margin to 8% compared with the level in fiscal 2004. The commitments are now expected to be met this fiscal year ending March 31, 2007.
“We are very pleased to be able to meet our commitments a year ahead of schedule,” said Andy Palmer, corporate vice president and head of Nissan’s LCV Business Unit at Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. “We launched two all-new products this year. We have some more exciting products in the pipeline and should put Nissan on track to become a leading player in the global LCV market,” Palmer added.
In fiscal year 2004, Nissan established a dedicated global LCV business unit to effectively coordinate the company’s efforts towards accelerating the profitable growth of the LCV business, one of four new growth areas for the company under the Value-Up plan. Since then, the LCV business unit has implemented a series of strategies to strengthen sales, including improving its product line-up and expanding its global market presence.
Sales of Nissan’s LCVs have grown steadily since fiscal year 2002, when they accounted for 182,000 units. In fiscal year 2005, Nissan sold 400,267 units and posted a consolidated operating profit margin of 7.7%.
In line with its global LCV breakthrough objective contained in the Nissan Value-Up plan, Nissan Middle East announced the establishment of a new Nissan LCV business unit. This new unit will be dedicated to enhancing Nissan's LCV business in the Middle East region and comes at a period of rapid growth for this segment in the GCC.
"We are extremely positive about the growth of our LCV sales over the past few years. In the first half of fiscal year 2006, our LCV sales in the GCC region are in line with our plan and 11% above the same period last year," said Reza Alavi, Head of LCV Business Unit at Nissan Middle East.
"Our Nissan URVAN minivan is a good illustration of the attractive business value proposition that we offer our customers - in September, for the second month in a row, the URVAN broke its record of the highest monthly sales to date in the GCC, and its year-to-date sales are up 47% compared to the 1st half of last year", added Alavi.
Nissan's LCV line-up in the region consists of the URVAN minivan, the CIVILIAN bus, the iconic PICKUP and the PATROL PICKUP.