A new hachiroku!

[Mux213]

Dorito, well they are all targetted as sportcars while you are right, the 350Z and S2000 are full sportscars while cars like this hachi roku, the rx8 and others in the same price catagory are more sport coupe's.

nmwisima, well a Seat Ibiza and an Audi A3 are basically also the same cars yet the audi is twice as expensive. With this its in part the lexus badge you are paying for and offcourse if you've ever looked INSIDE an IS200 you can also clearly see where the extra money went. Its the same deal with alot of car manufacturers.

As for basing it on an old model, the original plans for the new hachiroku I believe I saw early 2002, could be they just had this project on the backburner for awhile. It could also be the reason for the cheaper price ticket aswell. It wouldn't be the first time a car company cancels a line of their top line cars when it gets replaced by a newer model and then use the factory to create a cheaper car based on the same older platform to get squeeze a little extra out of their investment.

Again look at VAG, audi and VW gets their models first, a year later SEAT gets the new technology when audi and VW present their new models, and when they've sold enough of those Skoda gets a go. Take the ibiza based on the Golf 5 platform, it will be awhile before its released.