Nissan Will Expand Its Plant in Canton, Mississippi

CANTON, Miss., June 24 -- Today Nissan announced that it will expand its new assembly plant in Canton, Miss., in order to increase its North American manufacturing capacity. Nissan will invest $500 million to add 1 million-square feet to the 2.5 million-square foot plant, currently under construction. This new investment will increase the plant's annual production capacity from 250,000 vehicles to 400,000 vehicles and add approximately 1,300 new jobs to the plant's workforce.

The expansion in Canton will accommodate the additional production of Nissan Altima, which will continue to be built at Nissan's plant in Smyrna, Tenn. The award-winning sedan is selling at a record pace in North America.

This latest investment will also increase Nissan's flexibility to respond to demands for future new models in North America.

"Building products that meet the needs of the North American market is a vital ingredient to profitable growth," reiterated Carlos Ghosn, president and chief executive officer of Nissan. "We are investing further in our Canton plant in light of strong demand for Nissan products in North America."

In Canton, Nissan will build full-size pick up trucks, full-size sport utility vehicles for the Nissan and Infiniti lines, and the next generation Nissan Quest minivan. Production of the first vehicle is scheduled to begin in the spring of 2003; production of the Altima is planned to begin in Canton in the spring of 2004.

"The extension of our plant capacity in Canton is consistent with Nissan's strategy to increase presence in North America," said Emil Hassan, senior vice president of North American Manufacturing, Purchasing, Quality and Logistics. "Having the capacity in Canton to produce 150,000 additional Altimas will allow us to satisfy strong and growing demand for this car. It will also give us flexibility in configuring production of future products for North America."

The construction of the Canton plant began in April 2001. Construction of the extended facility will begin immediately. Once Nissan's Canton plant is constructed, it will join existing North American vehicle manufacturing facilities in Smyrna, and Aguascalientes and Cuernavaca in Mexico. Nissan produces engines at its plant in Decherd, Tenn. Nissan's production capacity in North America will be 1.3 million units upon completion of both phases of construction at Canton.

Nissan builds the Altima sedan, the Xterra sport utility vehicle, and the full line of Nissan Frontier compact pickup trucks in Smyrna. Production of the Nissan Maxima will begin there in early 2003.

For the eighth consecutive year, Nissan has been named as the most efficient manufacturer in North America, according to the Harbour Report North America 2002. The industry benchmark study was released last month.

Nissan's North American operations include automotive styling, engineering, consumer and corporate financing, sales and marketing, distribution and manufacturing. In May 2002, Nissan announced the 3-year NISSAN 180 growth plan, aiming for an additional 1 million unit sales worldwide by the end of FY2004. The achievement of this goal will be measured over a period of one year starting on October 1st, 2004 until September 30th, 2005. In this plan, the U.S. is targeted to grow by an additional 300,000 units.