UD Trucks of North American has announced that will no longer be part of the North American truck market, according to Hooniverse. Reasons given for this decision was a combination of factors, including the continued shrinking of the cabover engine market segment and the accelerating cost of regulatory compliance.
UD Trucks has offered a full line of medium duty Class 3 through Class 7 trucks for the U.S. since 1985.
However, it was clear for some time that UD’s market share was in decline since the Great Recession of 2008. That, coupled with the loss of their Class 3 and class 4 truck that was last offered in 2010, along with an ever escalating erosion of profit margins caused by a strengthening of the Yen, made this decision unavoidable, according to company officials.
In the letter written to their dealers, the Dayle Wetherell, president of UD Trucks North America stated:
“Trucks in UDNA and dealer inventory will be sold to end-users, and warranty and parts support for the population of UD trucks currently in the market will continue as usual. There is still limited production capacity for 2013 Model Year vehicles.
“Dealers can place orders until October 15, 2012, for trucks to be built before year end. Orders will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis, subject to available production capacity, and production orders are non-cancellable.
“There are approximately 300 trucks remaining in UDNA inventory”.
With the retreat of UD Trucks from the American Market, there will be but one cabover engine Class 6 and 7 truck left, built by Paccar in Mexico and marketed under both the Kenworth and Peterbilt brands. The design comes from Paccar’s European DAF Truck Group.
Headquartered in Greensboro, NC, UD Trucks North America is the U.S. distributor for the UD Trucks line of medium duty diesel truck chassis manufactured by UD Trucks Corporation.
UD Trucks Corporation, formerly Nissan Diesel Motor Company, was established in Japan in 1935 to manufacture and markets diesel engines, light, medium and heavy duty diesel trucks, buses, bus chassis and special-purpose vehicles to clients worldwide.
