In an interview with The Age, executive vice president of Lexus International, Kazuo Ohara, confirmed there are no plans for a SportCross variant of the new third-generation IS:
The brand has also ruled out a wagon version of the new IS for the time being.
“We’re not thinking about it now, not just now,” Ohara says. “The main market for wagon [body-style] is the European market. But because of currency issues, Euro issues, I don’t think it is still viable as a business with the current exchange rate.
“The type of wagon [we would try] to introduce to the European market [would be a] hybrid wagon, then it is a case that it would be even more difficult,” he says, making mention of the dominance of diesel power-trains in Europe, something Lexus steadfastly refuses to offer as part of its line-up.
There was an upsurge in rumors last week after a Lexus Facebook post suggested a new SportCross might be introduced at the Detroit auto show, but it looks like there’s little chance of a wagon for the time being.
(It would be nice to see a new Lexus wagon, but this rumor was blown way out of proportion — Lexus would never announce a new model so casually.)
[Source: The Age]
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