Nissan NV200 voted International Van of the Year

NV200, Nissan’s global all new small van, has been awarded the International Van of the Year (IVoY) 2010 by a jury consisting of 23 specialised European journalists representing a readership of more than half a million owners of commercial vehicles.

“The Jury was particularly impressed by the fact that Nissan created a compact light commercial vehicle that sets new standards in terms of internal space in relation to the external dimensions,” said the official statement from the IVoY Jury.

“We are delighted to receive the IVoY 2010 award as the recognition of Nissan’s determination to create innovative light commercial vehicles that exceed customer expectations,” said Andy Palmer, Senior Vice President, Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. “The NV200 is a global vehicle that associates unmatched levels of functionality with unique and attractive design. We offer our customers a vehicle that is an efficient and reliable business tool,” said Palmer.

The NV200 is a real segment breaker with exterior dimensions comparable to a car derived van and cargo capacity of a higher class. It is 4.4m long, 1.86m tall and 1.69m wide and comes with a cavernous cargo space. Intelligent packaging delivers a cargo load bay more than 2m in length, sufficient to carry two standard Euro pallets at the same time. The cargo floor is the lowest in its category, at only 524mm. As a result, NV200’s load cube offers a cargo volume of 4.2m3, around 25 per cent greater than the competitors’ average, offering an additional 1m3. 

In the UK the NV200 will initially only be offered in Van form, priced from £12,090. A Combi version complete with the option of seven seats will join the range later with prices announced closer to its launch in February.

The NV200 is already sold in Japan, where it instantly became the segment leader, with over 40% market share. In 2010 it will be launched China and sales in several other markets are in advanced study phase.

NV200 will also be produced globally. It is already produced in Japan and production in Europe will start this month (initial supply for the European market will be sourced from Japan). Production in China is planned for 2010.

Recently Nissan announced that a light commercial vehicle based on the NV200 will be the second electric vehicle to be launched by Nissan.