Back in early 2000, five Nissan auto designers fresh off the plane from Tokyo took to the high-ways and byways of Texas, where big pickup trucks are almost a religion. Outfitted with cowboy hats and boots, they stopped along the way to talk to ranchers, contractors, and other macho truck drivers. What they found is that Americans like their pickups big, very big, and loaded with creature comforts. The Nissan Motor Co. designers took careful notes. Now comes the payoff. While General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. go to the mat in what promises to be a nasty price war over their profitable pickups, the newly designed F-150 and the Chevrolet Silverado, the Japanese are swooping in for their piece of the $48 billion U.S. pickup truck market. On Oct. 17, the first Nissan Titan rolls off the line at a new factory in Canton, Miss. Four days later, Toyota Motor Manufacturing North America Inc. will break ground outside San Antonio for its second U.S. truck plant.
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