LOS ANGELES — Mitsubishi has begun development of an electric light truck it hopes to launch by April 2013, according to report in the Nikkei Japanese business daily.
The electric truck will be targeted at farmers, contractors and others who use light trucks for their work, the paper said.
Plans for an electric light truck designed for work duties highlight the variety of electrified vehicles Mitsubishi hopes to launch globally by 2016. A plug-in hybrid crossover, widely expected to be based on its Outlander crossover, is slated for sale in global markets by April 2013.
Mitsubishi is scheduled to begin retail deliveries of its first electric vehicle, the i minicar, to American customers next month. The car has been on sale in Japan since 2009, where it is known as the i-MiEV.
The electrified vehicles are part of Mitsubishi’s plan to refashion itself as a global EV leader by launching eight electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles around the world by 2016.
It’s unclear whether Mitsubishi’s electric light truck will be available in the U.S. market. Mitsubishi officials have said it’s unlikely that the U.S. market will get all of the eight EVs or PHEVs the company plans to launch by 2016.
Mitsubishi Motors is looking to sell 42,000 electric vehicles worldwide in fiscal 2012, double the number projected for this fiscal year, the Nikkei said.
The company aims to keep the sales price of the electric truck after government subsidies at less than 1.5 million yen ($19,200), making it cheaper than its two existing electric vehicles, the newspaper said.
Reuters contributed to this report.
