Nissan
Nissan's Theme is "Best Solutions Partner." Its exhibit features 18 vehicles, including the " AD Van" with its superb all-around functionality, and a "welfare taxi." "We provide solutions suited to the individual customer," said COO, Carlos Ghosn. The most popular vehicle in the Nissan exhibit is the "X Cargo," a one-box vehicle with a small truck base. This model was not announced prior to the opening of the show, and crowds have formed to see for themselves the "walk through" interior that allows even adults to move around freely. Also popular at the Nissan booth is the "El Grand Jumbo Taxi" ITS concept car.

Nissan Diesel
Nissan Diesel emphasizes economy and driver comfort with its theme, "Evidence of Performance, Comfort, and the Environment". Like other truck manufacturers, Nissan Diesel focuses on full suspension vehicles, and in this case the attention getter is the "Big Thumb CK-T" tractor included as a "reference exhibit." Many visitors took the opportunity to climb in the cab and take videos and photographs. Nissan Diesel also emphasizes hybrid vehicles in its bus exhibit. Its small non-step bus has been praised for excellent design thanks to its attractive red color. Also popular is the "CNG Condor," which uses clean, safe CNG as its fuel.

Suzuki
Suzuki brings 17 vehicles to the show this year, including 4 "reference exhibits." The "Pu3" commuter that was popular at last year's passenger car show appears again this year with a new passenger seat designed for wheelchairs. Younger visitors are also enthusiastic about the reference exhibit for the "Grand Vitara" SUV. The "Grand Vitara" is already on sale in the United States, and Suzuki has extended the wheel base to create a fiveseater pickup.

Honda
The theme "Anytime with Honda!" underlines Honda's emphasis on commercial vehicles that are just as useful on holidays and at home as they are at work. Honda has taken great pains with its presentation, and its "mh," a unique Honda-like utility vehicle that redesigns a small one-box vehicle into a pickup truck, is particularly popular. As you walk by, you can hear visitors exclaim, "What in the world is this?"

Fuji Heavy Industries
Titling its exhibit "Subaru Commercial vehicle-professional choice" Fuji Heavy has 16 vehicles on display, with particular emphasis on its "Samba" series of light vehicles. The exhibit illustrates the wide range of possibilities for light commercial vehicles, and showing them as everything from dump trucks to fire trucks, coffee vendors and nursing cars. The "Samba Green Truck" for professional gardeners is given high marks by visitors.

"X Cargo" designed to European tastes.

Nissan Diesel's "Big Thumb CK-T"

Suzuki ' s "Grand Vitara"

Honda's "mh"

Fuji Heavy's "Sambar Truck Green"

About half of the West Hall is devoted to parts manufacturers from Japan and other countries. With 90 companies, 1 organization and 2 governments exhibiting, the Parts Corner is every bit as large and crowded as it was for last year's passenger show. The Parts Corner is divided into six genres, including "electronics and telecommunications, "navigation," and "mechanical," plus special areas for foreign government exhibits. The area overflows with business people gathering catalogs and searching exhibits.

One of the highlights in the transmission corner is the Aisin Group's booth, focusing on the Aisin AW and cut-out models of the company's full line of transmissions that extends from mini cars to large trucks. This very visually-oriented display is a crowd pleaser. Another exciting display, and one that will probably only ever be seen in a commercial vehicle show, is that of special lamp manufacturer Patlite. The colorful exhibit of warning lamps for ambulances and police vehicles is one of the more popular spots with families.

The show is also notable for the increased coverage given telecommunications and IT equipment. Niles Parts displays a sleep alarm system that it developed in collaboration with Nissan Motor. Visitors use a mouse to close the eyes of a character shown on a computer screen. When the character is "asleep," an alarm sounds. Niles has been praised for a very easy to understand demonstration of how IT technology can contribute to safety.

Denso provides an animated presentation illustrating how advanced ITS technologies can be applied in, for example, cruise systems that control vehicle spacing. The governments of Sweden and Germany, both major truck manufacturing countries, display parts from their companies. Visitors were excited to learn more about the parts companies behind two of the world's "commercial vehicle powerhouses."

Embassy of Sweden Commercial Office booth

Aisin Group booth

Niles Parts booth

German Automobile Industry Association booth

On the panel were Mr. Seiichi Mizuno, a member of the House of Councilors and social marketer, Mr. Yasuhiro Yukawa, a senior researcher at Mitsubishi Corporation R&D Center Project Development Department, and Ms. Risa Stegmayer, a noted media personality. Writer Yotaro Konaka served as coordinator, with media personality Nami Takahashi acting as facilitator.

Like the symposium held on the first, this symposium attract a large and enthusiastic audience. Many could be seen taking notes. The question and answer session was notable for the many serious, searching questions asked. The audience was more than willing to remain when the session went over time.