Technician tests a Nissan car model at the Da Nang-based automobile plant. — VNS Photo Cong Thanh

TCIE Vietnam will produce the Nissan X-Trail SUV at its Da Nang automobile plant for the local and export markets, company Director Lee Jiunn Shyan said last week.

Lee said he hoped the new model would become a popular brand in the central city. The company, part of Malaysia’s Tan Chong Motor Group, started operations in the Hoa Khanh industrial zone in the city’s Lien Chieu District in 2013 with a total investment of US$40million.

The automobile plant has provided the domestic market with two sedan models – the Nissan Sunny XV automatic transmission and XL manual transmission – with 2,000 units manufactured during the first year. According to TCiE, the Nissan Sunny XL manual transmission model accounted for 60 per cent of sales in 2015.

The factory is the first and only Nissan Sunny assembly plant in central Viet Nam, with an annual capacity of 6,500 vehicles.

The company has invested in new production lines to diversify its car models in 2017. As scheduled, it will operate a new plant of vans and trucks at the Da Nang-based factory from 2017, with a total investment of $15 million. The new automobile plant will produce 500 Nissan vans and 2,000 Nissan trucks per year.

The city’s administration also asked the company to join as a supplier of buses for the city’s Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) development project.

In 2016, the city held a promotion event in Malaysia to call for investors in the fields of automobile electronic equipment, solar power cells, tourism and food processing, in addition to industrial parks.

Malaysia is the eighth biggest investor in Da Nang with 13 foreign direct investment projects worth $102 million. — VNS