BANGKOK: Nissan has opened an Asia-Pacific research centre in Thailand.
The new test centre, called Nissan Motor Asia Pacific (NMAP) R&D Test Center, would be the main R&D hub for Asean to better address customer needs in the region and to align more quickly to market requirements.
A total of 12 models would be tested at the Thai site, including Nissan’s core model Navara, Almera and X-Trail Hybrid.
The scope of NMAP’s work would be enlarged from the current quality assurance for product launches to the upstream product development phase of evaluation tests for trial prototypes. NMAP R&D test centre will serve the five Asean-member countries of Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand. The facility also will provide testing for more than 90 countries around the world.
Thailand has been a strategic market for Nissan in the Asia Pacific region since the establishment of the R&D centre in 2003. NMAP today boasts an R&D centre with industry-first testing facilities in Thailand: the anechoic chamber, acoustic chamber and vibration simulator with environment chamber.
Over 1 billion Thai baht (RM112mil) has been invested in the 6,600 square metre facility. By the end of fiscal year 2016, it would have a head count of 330 employees, with local engineers trained in Japan to operate the testing facilities.
