Firm’s latest crossover will be built in Sunderland and succeed its electric trailblazer

OFFICIAL PICTURE

Nissan has previewed new model, which will share Ariya platform

The new electric crossover to be built at Nissan’s Sunderland factory, announced earlier this year, will replace the Leaf hatchback, it has been confirmed.

The new model will be based on the Renault-Nissan- Mitsubishi Alliance’s CMF-EV platform, as used by the larger Ariya, and will be launched in around 2025.

By then, Nissan’s core lineup will comprise five models, all of them electrified crossovers, the Leaf replacement joining the Juke, Qashqai, Ariya and X-Trail.

Nissan expects full EVs to account for 80% of its sales by 2030, and by 2025 the firm will have electrified its entire range with either full EVs or ePower hybrids.

CEO Makoto Uchida confirmed that Nissan would not be investing in hydrogen technology, instead choosing to focus on battery-electric vehicles. “Our competitors have many solutions for technology,” he said. “For us, we decided EVs. We used to have hydrogen technology at Nissan, and maybe in a different world we still would. But so far, this [EVs] is our asset, and what we want to be on.”

He also responded to suggestions that Nissan had been slow to capitalise on the impact made by its decade-old pioneering Leaf EV by saying that he would be revealing plans for Nissan’s next era of electric cars and electrification later this autumn. On the effect the shortage of computer chips has had on car production, Uchida said “step by step it’s getting better” but that the crisis was far from over. He added that it has shown Nissan that “we have to adapt to new ways of working with suppliers [and] make partnerships stronger”.