Small, car-based pickups have been pickup up traction lately. Prime examples of these include the Ford Maverick and Hyundai Santa Cruz. There are also several of these offered in other parts of the world, particularly in Latin America.
By the looks of it, Nissan wants to dip its toes in that market, too. That’s following a recent press conference with fellow alliance members Renault and Mitsubishi. The company has announced that it is currently working on that kind of vehicle.
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At the time of writing, there is set launch date just yet. However, the new compact pickup will be based on something called the Renault Niagara. The Niagara was a concept revealed back in October. It’s based on the new generation CMB-F platform, the same chassis that will be used in the next-generation Kicks.
“We will enrich our line-up by utilizing Renault ’s expertise in half-ton pickup trucks, recently unveiled under the Niagara name. Similarly, Nissan will provide our proven capability in our 1-ton pickup, the Nissan Frontier, to help Renault increase its production presence in Argentina,” said Makoto Uchida, CEO of Nissan.
The Niagara, in concept form at least, uses a mild hybrid engine at the front and an electric motor at the back. Once the Nissan version reaches production, we could see it use e-Power technology. It’s still unknown if Mitsubishi will have its version of the compact truck, but there was no mention of it during the press conference.
For now, it seems that the product will be for the Latin American market. However, all Alliance members have stated expanding their respective product portfolios for Asia and Oceania.
