Nissan Motor Co's chief executive Carlos Ghosn said on Monday that the company will start selling the Kicks Crossover in Latin America this year.

In a report by the Channel News Asia, Nissan invested a staggering amount of $186 million to finance their Repende plant located some 100 miles northwest of Rio de Janeiro. The Resende plant will be responsible in manufacturing the Nissan Kicks Crossover that was first conceptualized and introduced at the 2014 Sao Paulo Auto Show. The plan to make the Repende plant home to the Crossover is seen to employ at least 600 additional workers in the region.

 

Currently, Nissan's Repende plant manufactures the compact cars Versa and March, but with the Crossover's intervention, Brazil sees a brighter future on employment after a previous recession that took away one in 10 workers the previous year. Nissan Motor's decision to have the Crossover manufactured in Brazil is not surprising, given how the country is among the five biggest auto markets. Brazil is also home to some major auto industry operations such as Volkswagen AG, General Motors Co., Ford Motor Co. and Fiat Chrysler Automobile NV.

The emergence of the Nissan Kicks Crossover has been the product of Nissan Design America in San Diego and Nissan Design America - Rio's great collaboration and conceptual plans. Along with the planned manufacturing of the Crossover is the marketing target of selling it globally, specially across the Latin America region.

Car Scoop also reported that the company is conducting studies on marketing the Kicks Crossover to other regions beyond Latin America. During Ghosn's announcement, he also said, "Nissan invented the first crossover in 2003, with the Murano. Since then, we've established our global crossover leadership with vehicles like JUKE, Qashqai and X-Trail -- which have been great successes. The Kick's will bring Nissan's unique Crossover expertise to more regions.

Nissan's newly conceptualized Crossover specification is 4,300 mm in length, 1,800 mm in width and 1,600 mm in height. The wheelbase of the new Kicks Crossover will be approximately 103.1 inches. Compared to the JUKE, the Nissan Kicks Crossover will have a bigger profile in terms of length and wheelbase, whereas the height and width of the Kicks Crossover will be similar to the JUKE.

While there is no specific date on the new Nissan Kicks Crossover launch in Latin America, the company promises that 2016 will be the year of the new Nissan Kicks Crossover.

What do you think of this new Nissan car model? Are you looking forward to seeing what it has to offer?