New Hino 500 enters local production
The latest range of Hino 500 Wide Cab trucks has gone into production at Hino South Africa’s plant in Prospecton, Durban.
Hino announced the news during the line-off ceremony held in Durban earlier this week.
The Hino 500 range has been expanded from five to 12 models in the first full-model change in 14 years.
The start of production follows Hino South Africa’s longest and most intensive pre-launch marketing programme, which included road shows in Gauteng, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal and will continue to Namibia and Botswana in January 2018.
Vice president of Hino SA, Ernie Trautmann, says: “The increased Hino 500 range, including 6×4 models, will allow us to compete in many niche segments that we were not in previously.
“The many additional features in the new Hino 500 model range, as well as competitive pricing and the much bigger line-up, should enable us to regain our dominance in the local heavy commercial vehicle market.”
The introduction of this latest model into the Prospecton plant involved an investment of more than R20 million by Hino SA. It included several significant changes to the assembly process, most of which are aimed at improving productivity and quality, while lessening the physical load on team members.
Masamichi Mizukoshi, the managing officer of production and production control at Hino Motors Limited, who attended the line-off ceremony, said he was highly impressed with the plant in Prospecton. He challenged the team members to work together to strive to become the highest-quality Hino plant outside Japan.