Nissan is set to invest US$500 million into its Canton Vehicle Assembly Plant in Mississippi to refurbish the plant for EV production from 2025 onwards.
Canton, at which nearly five million vehicles have been manufactured since the facility’s inauguration in 2002, is currently dedicated to the manufacture of the Altima sedan, and the Frontier and Titan / Titan XD pickup trucks. Once the refurbishment is complete however, Canton will also support production of two all-new, all-electric vehicles, one each from Nissan and sister premium brand, Infiniti.
Nissan EV teaser
The investment is set to safeguard, and “upskill”, at least 2,000 jobs at Canton, which already employs approximately 5,000 people.
This latest instalment brings Nissan’s total investment into the Mississippi plant up to US$4 billion, with the Japanese marque having now put US$13.5 billion collectively into its US manufacturing network.
“Today’s announcement is the first of several new investments that will drive the EV revolution in the United States,” Nissan COO Ashwani Gupta explains in an official statement. “Nissan is making a strong investment in Canton’s future, bringing the latest technology, training and process to create a truly best-in-class EV manufacturing team.”
Though Nissan did not disclose the identity of the two brand-new EVs, an accompanying release and video vignette from Infiniti showed that its new EV would be a five-door sedan, the sleek outline having previously been teased alongside two further EVs in December last year.
Infiniti EV teaser
Both Infiniti’s teaser video and Nissan’s announcement are the latest showcase of the Nissan Group’s electrification strategy, the former having confirmed that the majority of its vehicles will feature electrified counterparts by 2030 in lieu of a fully EV product line-up.
“By 2030 we envisage that the majority of Infiniti models sold globally will be electrified,” Infiniti chairman Peyman Kargar continues. “In confirming one of the future locations where our new generation of electric products will be built, we progress towards achieving this goal.”
Read more: Nissan investing US$17.6 billion in EV development
Nissan’s ‘Ambition 2030’ strategy meanwhile, outlined last November, is a lot more comprehensive, with 23 Nissan and Infiniti EVs are set to be launched by 2030 – including 15 all-electric vehicles – ahead of carbon neutrality “across the company’s global operations and the life cycle of its products” by 2050. That 40 per cent of Nissan’s sales in the US will come from full EVs by 2030 is another intermediary goal.
