Just to be clear, Mark Rechtin is an Automotive News writer - not a Lexus planner - and Brian Smith's comments hypothetically talk about adding a three row crossover to the mix, and say that one of the two existing BOF SUVs
could convert to unibody:
"Smith says one of the brand’s two large body-on-frame SUVs, the GX and LX, could be converted to unibody platforms as the auto maker works to meet looming government-imposed fuel-economy regulations.
“In the future, if we could do a 3-row unibody (utility vehicle), I think that’s what consumers would want to see,” he says.
That can be taken any number of ways, but the article was published two and a half years ago and is pretty out of touch now. There has been more recent commentary from Lexus stating that both the GX and LX have core markets and loyal consumers looking for BOF construction, and that they're both extremely profitable products.
Quite frankly, in 15 years, I do not think there will be BOF SUVs in the lineup, but looking at the near term, I really do not think that Lexus is considering switching either to unibody - for various reasons. I expect to see another CUV added with a new name, positioned above the RX.