A lot of models for Benz are down as they have a supply issue.
The LS 500 has hit its rather modest sales target of
1k/month only
once, so doesn't look lit it'll hit 12k sales for the year.
Meanwhile, the current S Class, did over
24.5k sales in its first full year of sale, despite commanding a pretty hefty price premium over the LS.
The LS has always outsold the S Class (relative to the 1st year of sale) until the LS 500.
The LS 400, 430 and 460
all sold over
30k in their respective 1st year of sale (the 400 did over 40k).
Even w/ the decline in sedan sales, shouldn't be such a drastic drop off in LS sales (didn't see that when the current S Class launched).
In addition, unlike the S Class, the US is pretty much the only big selling market for the LS.
It doesn't sell well in Japan (in fact, no Lexus model really sells well - only the NX really sells over 500/month and not always).
So, w/o greater sales here (or elswhere), it's going to take a long time to get ROI (this is a major reason why Toyota drew out the life of the 460 for so long).
How do you know it's not going to happen?
Kia Australia has passed on the Santa Cruz b/c they want a proper Hilux competitor.
There have been numerous reports of H/K seriously mulling doing a proper BoF pickup and SUV.
Do you know something they (among others) don't know?
https://www.carsales.com.au/editorial/details/hyundai-plotting-toyota-landcruiser-rival-114248/
And what's the business case for the low-volume Essentia?
Like I had stated, Toyota is developing a new bi-turbo 4.0T for Lexus (and
Cadillac has their own new FI V8).
If Hyundai wants Genesis to play w/ the
big boys (or even just the Tier 1.5 ike Lexus and
Cadillac - they're gonna need a new V8, including if they want to do a performance variant of the next G80 (or even the GV80 - what's the point of going RWD w/ its CUVs if performance variants are not part of the plan?).