Nissan today confirmed the name of its forthcoming small Crossover car.

The Nissan Juke will go on sale from October, following its global public premiere at Geneva Motor Show in March.

The model will inject some much-needed dynamism into the small car segment, offering European car-buyers an alternative to the traditional, uninspiring small hatchback.

As the fourth Crossover in Nissan’s European range, Juke reinforces the brand’s pioneering Crossover leadership in Europe.

The car was inspired by the Qazana concept car that received such a warm reception at the 2009 Geneva Motor Show, and will fit into the Nissan range between the Note compact family car and the Qashqai crossover.

Nissan’s customer research identified a large proportion of European small and compact car buyers whose needs are not met by what they perceive to be uninspiring and unoriginal options available to them where copycat hatchbacks dominate.

"We know that there are a lot of customers that are looking for a car which combines striking design, agile handling and driving pleasure, user friendly technology but not at the expense of practicality and convenience," said Simon Thomas, Nissan’s European Senior Vice President for Sales and Marketing.

"We’re confident that Juke will bring a new generation of customers to Nissan, in the same way that Qashqai did. "Our philosophy of challenging conventions with Qashqai has been a huge success. We’ve ju

st reached the 500,000 landmark and we’re applying many of the lessons learned from Qashqai to Juke."

Juke will be manufactured alongside the Qashqai, Qashqai+2 and Note at Nissan’s state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Sunderland, Great Britain.

(PR/BMcc)