Suzuki to Sell Nissan Frontier-Based Pickup

You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Although Suzuki and Nissan have a slightly more formal agreement than this, it pretty much sums up the gist of their partnership. In its home market of Japan, kei cars (tiny sub-subcompact city cars) make up a huge portion of Japan’s market share, however, up until recently Nissan didn’t have much by the way to offer consumers.

On the flip side of the coin, Suzuki is an expert in manufacturing small cars; as Japan’s leading producer of kei cars in Japan, Nissan entered into a partnership that would essentially allow it to sell re-badged Suzuki products. In return, so far, Nissan has produced some of Suzuki’s products at its Thai plant and has allowed Suzuki to sell its Serena minivan amongst other small trades, but now, bigger things are starting to appear on the horizon as Suzuki is calling its favor.


Though Suzuki may be a small car expert, it’s never really had the know-how and expertise when it came to larger vehicles, a particularly important area for North America. With the exception of the SX4 and the Grand Vitara, most of its products sold here are either rebadged GMDAT (ex-Daewoo) vehicles, or were heavily influenced by outside sources (XL7 and its relatives, the Equinox and Torrent). For some reason, Suzuki feels that the next move it needs to make is to enter the pickup truck segment, which is where its relationship with Nissan will come into play.

Suzuki will be selling a rebadged version of Nissan’s midsize Frontier pickup truck, with production starting during the third quarter of 2008 at Nissan’s plant in Tennessee. The truck will be sold exclusively in North America.

The topic of a Suzuki truck isn’t just a rumor, but something confirmed by both manufacturers to be true. As of right now we don’t know if Suzuki’s version will feature different sheetmetal, or which can body configurations will be offered, but their truck will feature the same mechanical running gear. This means that it will feature the proven F-Alpha platform, and the strong 4.0-liter, DOHC V6 engine. In Nissan guise, the V6 makes 261 hp and 281 lb-ft of torque, which grants it the ability to tow up to 6,500 lbs.

Venturing into rumor mill territory, sources are suggesting that the truck could be called “Equator”, a name that would fit the rough ‘n tumble vehicle quite well. Judging by the production schedule, it’s also likely that we’ll get a chance to see the Suzuki truck at an auto show this spring, such as Chicago or New York.