We have been hearing and reading a lot about the speculated joint venture between Japanese car manufacturer Nissan Motors and Indian commercial vehicle maker Ashok Leyland and now, finally, we have something very concrete to offer to our readers. Yes, we have official confirmation.

Nissan Motors today, signed the joint venture with Ashok Leyland in Chennai in a press conference where also present were Dr. Andy Palmer, Senior Vice-President, Nissan Motor Company and Chairman, Ashok Leyland Nissan Vehicles Ltd. and Dr. V Sumantran, Executive Vice Chairman, Hinduja Automotive Ltd. and Chairman, Nissan Ashok Leyland Powertrain Ltd. Nissan India also revealed its inclination towards exploring the possibilities of building an Rs 2.5 Lakh small car with Ashok Leyland.

The two partners also revealed their plans to manufacture and market an entire range of Light Commercial Vehicles (LCVs) was quite on the projected schedule. They also said that the initial new products will start rolling out from the mid 2011. While two out of these will be manufactured at the Hosur plant of Ashok Leyland, the third will be manufactured at the production facility of Nissan at Oragadam.

While addressing the media at a press conference, Dr. Andy Palmer, Senior Vice-President, Nissan Motor Company and Chairman, Ashok Leyland Nissan Vehicles Ltd., said, “The JV is moving forward at full throttle now although we had been forced to slow down a bit during the recessionary phase last year. The Indian LCV segment has witnessed very robust growth over the past decade and by joining our complementary forces, we have created synergies to launch our products for this market on schedule – just 3 years after the formation of the joint venture.”

“Within this JV, we have endeavoured to utilize our learnings relative to customer and market needs and taking forward the best Indian traditions of Indian frugal enterprise. The JV benefits from blending these factors together with Nissan’s long heritage of top-class engineering and quality orientation. We have closely observed changes in market dynamics, the greater role for intra-city and last mile goods distribution and rapidly evolving customer expectations. We feel our products, born out of the JV’s cost conscious quality orientation coupled with the substantial advancement of product technologies, will help us deliver very competitive value to our customers,” Dr. V Sumantran, Executive Vice Chairman, Hinduja Automotive Ltd. and Chairman, Nissan Ashok Leyland Powertrain Ltd., said.

The JV will offer a modern, feature loaded F24 platform that will bring forth trucks and buses in the 5–7.5 tonne GVW (Gross Vehicle Weight) category. Powering these will be a 3-litre, 4-cylinder Common Rail Diesel engine which will comply with the new emission norms in India.

The LCV, to be christened NV200, will be offered in two versions – a people mover and a load carrier version. The NV200 people mover will likely be priced at about INR 7-9 Lakhs and the load carrier will sport a relatively lower price. A pricing like this will surely give the Tata Winger a run for its money. And while all this is happening, we cannot rule out the possibility of churning out a car for the Indian market.