The all-new Mazda CX-5 crossover, which made its global debut at the 2016 Los Angeles Auto Show two weeks ago, entered production on Monday at Ujina Plant No. 2 near the company's global headquarters in Hiroshima.
This second-generation CX-5 will go on sale in Japan in February before being rolled out to global markets, Mazda announced.
Total Mazda CX-5 production reached one million units in April 2015, making it the second-fastest Mazda to reach this milestone after the Mazda3. By October of 2016, production topped approximately 1.57 million units.
The CX-5 now accounts for about a quarter of Mazda's annual sales.
It will be very interesting to see how much the addition of a diesel engine (available in the fall of 2017) will help Mazda attract new customers in the ultra-competitive compact SUV/CUV segment.
