Northern Chartered Accountant Students' Society

To Infiniti and beyond – 30 years of Nissan in Sunderland (and we were there) 19 May 2016

In its thirtieth year and currently producing more than 500,000 cars per year, the Nissan manufacturing facility in Sunderland is an impressive site. The plant is built on the former Sunderland Airfield, with vehicle production taking place on two lines, allowing a car to roll off the production line every 59 seconds. 80% of all vehicles are exported worldwide from the River Tyne.

NCASS students and other ICAEW colleagues had the golden opportunity of visiting the ‘Trim & Chassis’ part of the production process for Line 1 where the Qashqai and Leaf models are born.  Seeing a shop floor, the heart of any manufacturing business, helps to tangibly understand an entity and seeing the ‘just in time’, ‘Kaizen’ and ‘job rotation’ philosophies in action certainly aided that.

The factory has come a long way since an assembly line for the Nissan Bluebird in 1986 evolved into the current two production lines, taking raw materials, even from the point of pressing the steel, through to a finished product in about 25 hours.  That evolution continues with the new Infiniti Q30 model which started production last year on Line 2.

NCASS would like to thanks NM(UK) for hosting this superb event, for which proceeds will be donated to St Oswald’s Hospice.

About NCASS
NCASS (Northern Chartered Accountant Students’ Society) is the official body that represents ACA students under ICAEW training contracts in the Northern Society area in the North East of England and Cumbria. We have been supporting student chartered accountants across northern England since 1896.
The society is run by ACA student volunteers for ACA students and, space permitting, new committee members are always welcome.