Sad as it may be, sedans are a dying breed. If there’s any indication of the sedan’s ever-diminishing importance to most automakers, it’s in the smaller-than-ever scale of new model launches and ensuing amount of coverage by media outlets and automotive journalists in comparison to that of the same brand’s SUVs/CUVs. Among the most notable vehicles affected by this is the Lexus LS.
Launched in 1989 to the all-new Lexus brand, the original Lexus LS 400 was a true revolutionary and industry game-changer, causing people to rethink the definition of luxury vehicle and established luxury brands to revamping their entire strategies to combat this. An astounding success, the LS sold over 42,000 units in the U.S. for its inaugural year and sold more than any other luxury flagship for 15 of its first 17 years. While this third generation 2004 LS 430 may look tired and dated now, for its time it was quite a noteworthy automobile.
The luxury automobile landscape, however, has changed dramatically in the last 30 years — even the last 15 years — and Lexus LS is no longer a very talked-about vehicle. Despite highs and lows through its now five generations, with the most recent fifth generation decidedly its highest watermark in many years, it’s difficult to determine if the LS is even at the top of its class. Quite honestly, flagship luxury sedans in general are so little talked-about anymore that few automotive media outlets care to even do comparison tests anymore.
Luxury flagship SUVs, including the BMW X7, Mercedes-Benz GLS, and Range Rover prove far more popular than their 7 Series, S-Class, and Jaguar XJ counterparts, and usually come in significantly less costly. Lexus’ archaic LX is the one exception, selling less than the LS does.
If it’s any proof, this new Lexus LS 500 has been out for a year now and of the paltry handful I’ve seen, 4 out of 5 (including this one) have been on dealer plates, meaning they’re being used as Lexus dealer manager demos. Despite its complete redesign with competitive technology, luxury, safety and powertrain, the new LS hasn’t sold many units. Sales did nearly double in 2018 but that’s not saying much as the LS had only once surpassed 10,000 units annually since 2010 — a sad fate for one of the most historically significant industry game-changers of all time. The LS may have been launched under the slogan “The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection”, but as it pertains to flagship fullsize luxury sedans in this day and age, does it really matter anymore?
Photographed in Hingham, Massachusetts – April 2019
someone has to do something about this……….i type in my reply and it tells me i am posting too fast and then completely removes all i typed in……………this is really annoying as sometimes you type in long and lose all you type and have to start all over again.
Logging in usually stops this annoying issue 99% of times.
As always, copy the entire text before clicking Post Comment. I learnt to do that long time ago. Or you can open up the Notepad in Windows or Mac and type the comment before copying and pasting it to Curbside Classic. This way, you don’t have to worry about losing the ‘Great American Novel’ due to glitch…
Will do Oliver!!
If you use Firefox there’s a plugin called Textarea Cache that automatically saves what you type in text fields in case the window gets closed or there’s an error.
The Lexus LX probably doesn’t sell very well because it is still essentially a Land Cruiser in drag. And why has BMW gone overboard with the grilles on the X7 and the latest 7-series? They are bordering on the garish now.
Garish? I reckon they’ve crossed through ‘garish’ and are out the other side to ‘Full Edsel’.
The Gen 3 looks stately. The new one not so much. But I get why sedans are dying out – a crossover seating position is more comfortable to drive for me. I can even go down a class size with a smaller footprint and still be more comfortable than a sedan….
The photo of Mercedes-Benz GLS didn’t look right until I looked through the Net.
Ah, it’s extensively revised for 2020 model year with new dashboard and somewhat stubby-looking nose. We’re supposed to wait until Friday to see the official unveling at New York Auto Show.
Will the Mercedes-Maybach GLS have V12 engine? Stay tuned…
The new LS looks like a Camry thats been stung by bees and then kicked in the face with a steel toe boot. The old LS looks like a Mercedes S class.
Progress?
I wouldn’t call the new car’s styling ‘good’ necessarily, but overwrought fake sporty is the lesser evil vs stuffy, stodgy and elderly…that’s the ‘04. That looks for all the world a successor to the gingerbready broughams from 10-25 years earlier and meant for the same basic crowd.
The pictured new Lexus makes my 2019 Camry look like quite the bargain at half the price of the Lexus.
In my opinion: The original Lexus LS 400 series had a certain type of conservative, understated elegance and classy aura to it.
Not so much today?
Agreed on the original LS. It’s not for me either, but that car’s styling has a certain timeless thing going on. The semi-neoclassical look of the ‘04…yuck.
Seconded.
They really stood out against the long-in-the-tooth Mercedes W126, and got a further boost from the brick-like W140 in 1992.
But, yes, these have shrunk to insignificance in today’s automotive landscape.
As a New Yorker the real signal is their virtual disappearance from “black car” fleets. They were never a big player, but the only Lexi you see today in car service are RXs. S-Classes are pretty rare, and XTSes are getting very thin on the ground. Lots of Escalades, though.
How many new S-Classes and BMW 7-series do you see on the road compared to 20 years ago? They’re all in a slump and all of them (Audi A8 and big Jag, too) are to some degree getting their lunch eaten (especially in California) by the Tesla Model S.
But if I were in the market for a big luxury sedan, I’d be strongly tempted to go with the Lexus. The styling comes off better in person than in photos, it’s as quiet and smooth as ever, but you can dial in some feedback through the adaptive system and—if I’m dropping six figures for a car, I’d like it to work and hold its value. And that’s where Lexus still beats the European big sedans.
It may be a by-product of how these are purchased, or more specifically, leased. I don’t know for sure, but I assume more of the high end models are leased than purchased outright. When you compare the lease cost of a luxury sedan versus a SUV, the SUV usually wins, and is as fashionable (or more) than a comparably priced sedan. As the residual value of sedans keeps going down, the monthly lease cost rises. SUVs and Trucks hold their value better than sedans, so the lease cost is less. Also, Teslas are available via lease, which seems imminently safer than outright purchase until 10 year overall costs can be more accurately predicted. We may see older EVs that are not viable due to battery replacement costs, or we may see that was a worry that never came to fruition. The history with hybrid battery systems seems to predict the latter.
The degrading battery issue is going to be a HUGE one. Don’t forget, what’s used in cars is the same battery technology that’s in cordless tools, cel phones etc. I can’t speak for androids but Im on my 4th iPhone and after 1.5-2 years the run time is dramatically worse. With cordless tools it varies. I’ve owned a half dozen or so systems and I’ve had batteries die after a couple years and I’ve had some last 10 years.
What people forget about hybrids is that the traction battery can completely die and the car can revert to pure gas power. I see priuses all the time running on the gas motor in parking lots, at stoplights, in crawling traffic etc—this is specifically where it’s SUPPOSED to be on electric. If a hybrid is used on the freeway, how often is it even using electric? The level of discharge apparently affects battery life. With pure EVs, you’re fully dependent on batteries. If you MUST have a full electric, leasing is the way to go. They’re just not a good long term proposition and for the same reasons no one still uses an iPhone much older than the 6.
Please don’t compare EV battery systems with the ones in your phone and power tools. They are managed much more extensively, in terms of how fast they are charged and most importantly, how much charge they are given, and how low they are discharged. When you let your power tools or phone run down to empty and then charge it to 100%, that is absolutely brutal, and is why their lives are shortened. I have a six-year old iPhone 5 whose battery still works quite well, and I have Makita cordless tools whose batteries are now over 10 years old, and they still work fine. I charge them BEFORE they get close to empty. And EV batteries are typically not charged to 100%, but preferably 90% or less.
The Prius with the gas engine on that you hear almost certainly is because the Prius has to run its gas engine initially to warm up. That does not mean its batteries are dead.
You’re just spreading misinformation. Most Prii go over 300k miles with their original batteries, and Teslas have gone several hundred thousand miles on their original batteries.
You’be been bashing the Prius and EVs for years here, meanwhile both are being used very successfully by taxi operators, who run hundreds of thousands of miles on them. Maybe you should stick to what you know, like hot rod engines?
Agreed. I have a 2019 Honda Insight. The software does not allow the battery to discharge completely and is rarely charged all the way to 100%. The software prevents the battery from being treated like a phone or cordless tool. Oh, I have an 8 year warranty on the battery.
Hyundai is one manufacturer that warranties their battery for as long as the original owner owns their car. I’m not seeing the downside there.
Every other manufacturer warrants their hybrid batteries for 8yrs, 100k miles or more, and I believe it is 10/150 in some states. Somehow I don’t think it’s exactly the same tech that’s in your phone or laptop. I also don’t see people lining up en masse to have their batteries replaced.
I thought we were beyond this misinformation campaign.
*iPhone 5 user raises hand*
I spent $30 on a battery replacement kit and it works like new since. Bigger problem is Apple’s planned obsolescence cutting IOS updates for it…
-Matt
Whats the advantage of using an older iPhone? I don’t know how you use yours…my laptop gets cracked for building eBay ads and paying bills, most of my net surfing is mobile…and I have tons of music, both MP3’s and apps.I get that the battery is cheap to replace. But you’re right about that planned in obsolescence…although I think some of that is inevitable at the rate software and networks are advancing. My 5s was 16gig which would be inadequate these days. With how Sprint amitorizes an upgrade and my work discount, for me it’s not worth it to refurbish an old phone. That’s where tools differ DRASTICALLY.
Nick—
You’re right about the ‘cult of apple’ and I’ve never got the need to have the latest rectangle. I’ve found that it’s better to upgrade to one generation behind the newest when re-upping a contract…50-70% savings right there. Im not brand loyal to apple, it’s just what’s familiar and Apple is supposedly more hacker/virus proof. Real or percieved, it’s about piece of mind.
My music takes up maybe half the 16 gig storage, I use it pretty much for music, call/text, web browsing and the odd app here and there. Besides the few times I maxed the storage on downloaded podcasts(which I periodically delete anyway) there’s been no incentive to upgrade. I also have an iPad to split the difference, but its current storage too is nowhere near 16gig. Besides that I basically traded a case of beer in exchange for this phone, I’ll never spend several hundreds or more on a device I consider what is at best a convenient toy and at worst a necessary evil to live a normal life during this century.
I think you and I are very similar in our automotive preferences overall, but I do see a light with EVs and my ancient Apple phone was the catalyst for my epiphany – traction batteries will probably end up near universal in packaging when the cars become very common, and not only that, cheap. Most likely the same cottage industry that provided my phone battery and the tools to open up the seemingly intimidating device will exist to keep an old “obsolete” EV on the road as well. I still dislike Hybrids, but not because of the battery issue, which is indeed mostly a non-issue, I just don’t like the way they drive. I’m an all or nothing type of person.
Do you mean six months or six years. iPhone owners have this superiority complex and look down on anyone without the latest iPhone. Such people also must have the newest car and usually put nothing down or Mommy is making the lease payment
Oh dear, having a Prius running on gasoline when it ought to be in electric mode – is that the worst possible kind of virtue-signalling?
MoparRocker74 said, “What people forget about hybrids is that the traction battery can completely die and the car can revert to pure gas power.” Actually for the record, the Toyota/Lexus full hybrid system cannot run without the traction battery. For one thing, it drives one of the motor/generators that spins up the crankshaft to start the engine.
That MG also varies the effective gear ratio from engine to wheels thru the planetary gear set, acting as a CVT. Usually in a full hybrid the engine and the electric path are both contributing power to drive the wheels. You can see this in the instantaneous mpg meter while driving. It fluctuates from 20 mpg (max engine) to 100 mpg (engine off) and everywhere in between as the load and your right foot vary their demands.
Unlike the battery in a phone or power tool, a hybrid’s traction battery can call on the engine for charge whenever it needs some, and can limit the power it’s providing when it’s low. There’s a battery computer dedicated to keeping battery charge and load in their sweet spots. Toyota/Lexus provides about twice the battery capacity it uses for long lifetime.
Hmmm. I remember reading that priuses use a standard car battery to start the engine and the traction battery did the propulsion at low speeds. Of course that could be some other hybrid altogether…and that’s part of the issue in that it seems no two work the same. Didn’t Honda get a bunch of blowback over the civic and/or something else since it’s never really ‘full’ electric mod? Or am I thinking of something else yet again?
Im aware as PN pointed out that on a cold startup a non-plugin needs to run the gas engine in order to get the batteries up to temp. Commonly on older priuses, Im seeng them on warm afternoons in store parking lots running off the gas engine. A girl I used to date had an older hybrid Escape and complained it seemed to always be on gas. But thats yet a 3rd system which I don’t fully understand either.
Priuses have a 12V battery that runs all the computers, as well as lights and wipers. So it won’t start if the 12V battery gets run down somehow, even with charge in its traction battery.
Honda’s got a “mild” hybrid system which is a single pancake motor/generator on the output shaft between engine and a conventional transmission. All it can do is capture energy when engine braking and give it back when accelerating. Not as effective as a “full” hybrid with two MGs and planetary gears. The 1st-gen Insight’s great mileage had as much to do with its light weight, small size and aerodynamics as the mild hybrid.
From cold the Prius runs its engine lightly loaded just to warm it and its catalytic converter up to be clean, while most drive energy is electric. Recent Priuses have a thermos for some coolant to minimize warmup time on a series of short trips. It’s worth remembering that ultra-low emissions was a Toyota design priority, as well as much better mileage.
The first-gen (US) Prius had its AC compressor driven by the engine, so the engine had to run for cooling even when stopped, like you saw. Now it’s driven by an electric motor, and the water pump has a motor too, so there are no external belts.
Ford’s 2005 Escape has a full hybrid system like Toyota’s, which Ford mostly developed on their own. They cross-licensed each other’s patents.
Shame it doesn’t come with adaptive styling; I’d dial out some of that front end. But seriously, they’ve left themselves nowhere to go for the next model. That front end theme is as exaggerated as they could possibly make it. The next one will have to be more conservative. Surely…?
It’s interesting how in the last side by side picture you can see the vestigial beginnings of the “spindle grille” start to take form between the upper grille and the angle of the fog light surrounds at the bottom. Visualize the bumper being gone and replaced with more grille and it’s there. It’s always fascinates me to see a current trend or design being very subtly moved in a certain direction several generations prior.
The LS currently starts at about $11,000 less than the LX, so it goes the other way in pricing – Of all the SUV’s in that competitive space, virtually none of which will ever go much further offroad than a soccer field parking lot, the LX is in my opinion still the one that likely would do best offroad (perhaps matched by the RR), but once longevity, durability, and reliability are factored in, the LX is peerless (which of course also goes for its genesis, the LandCruiser, which at this point is priced as more of a cashgrab in the US than anything else for those that have to have a Land Cruiser – there isn’t much real reason why it has to cost much more than a Sequoia).
Hmm – so you could update the ’04s appearance by painting that central section of the bumper black, and outlining the spindle shape on the bumper with chrome tape! The rest of the styling’s still pretty clunky and derivative though, but the Japanese have aftermarket parts to fix that (more or less).
It just no longer matters.
I don’t even look at these vehicles, know what model they are, or care how they perform. I’m downtown in a busy capital city, in front of a street level window on a busy street – and if it wasn’t for cheap Hyundai cars, there are no sedans driving by. The products being promoted in the market are not sedans or coupes.
It is a new world.
Final note – that new Lexus is trying to hard to get attention, and it looks ridiculous. There is not a shred of class in its overwrought exterior.
Nice write up Brendan!! and catching these two side by side is a really great pic. This is where they started going wrong becoming a blatant copy(stylewise)of a Benz. They lost their originality. They have become the Buick of imports(not a bad thing). I would love to own one of these(2019)as they are amazingly reliable and very well appointed cars. and at least they dont look too much like everything else on the road. i’ve owned 2 Lexus, a 94 LS400 and a 97 ES300 both excelent vehicles.
The market has moved on from sedans, and is now centrally focused on overwrought styling of compact sport utility vehicles brought to you by every manufacturer there is. Mandatory styling cues: wedge shaped windows, sculpted headlights wrapped halfway around the front fender, crazy taillights in the bumper, beside the back window, or anywhere they can find a spot, oh and let’s not forget overdesigned alloy wheels that will be impossible to keep clean. There you have it, our vehicle choices in 2019.
It may matter if they can ride out the crossover craze while others drop their sedans, gathering the remaining marketshare from attrition. Worked for the Tacoma and 4Runner. May not work in this segment, I don’t see the S Class conceding the field.
But yes, this segment and the LS has contracted to irrelevance and FSport badges and spindle grills won’t change that. The LC500 is a stunning car…that isn’t selling either.
FWIW, the new LS has some real presence on the road. I’ve only seen one, a metallic brown without the FSport frippery, and it draws your eyes in a way that a bar-of-soap A8 and conservative S Class and 7 Series do not. I don’t like white one pictured here, wrong color for this car.
Also: as garish, ridiculous and cynical as the new X7 is, Lexus needs one. The LX570, god bless its Land Cruiser bones, is too much truck in a crossover world. It needs to look tough, not be tough.
Yeah, that’s a nice colour. The old one looked quite nice in metallic brown; I saw one a few weeks back. You could tell it was a prestige car. I didn’t think the design was dated. I was surprised to find there was a new one, and that the styling had gone full-Transformers mode this time. Doesn’t look like a prestige sedan anymore.
I can’t say I agree that they don’t look prestigious; Since 2010 Jaguar has been making an XJ that completely broke the mold, and when you see one there is zero doubt you are looking at an expensive piece of work. Not to say it’s to everyone’s taste, but the presence certainly is there.
Is the new one a Lexus or a Camry?
The older one looks more like a Camry (from the period) than the the new one does, although I do see a lot of styling similarities between the Lexus and Toyota sedans these days. The current Camry looks like a spindle grille with a weird growth on its nose.
People love ’em though, although the S/CUV(s) are taking over, sadly.
The pictured new Lexus makes my 2019 Camry look like quite the half priced bargain by comparison.
Isn’t the new featured LS more Avalon sized? I’m not sure here. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
The ES and the Avalon are built on the same platform. Both are 195.9 inches long. The LS is 206.1 inches.
The above pictured Camry is 193 inches long.
Call me a luddite, but I hope that the suv/cuv/brodozer fetish dies out sooner rather than later. Own an older subaru suv and an accord touring. I prefer the accord over our subaru for daily commuting as it is far more comfortable not to mention economical. The only thing appealing about our suv is the extra carry capacity that I use maybe twice a year and the high seating position which my old bones appreciate at times.
I see cars like the Lexus, Genesis, MB, Beem and Audi’s as well as Tesla all the time here. They are as popular as ever in my neck of the woods.
Trucks, SUV and CUV are terrible line of sight blockers when one drives a sedan or smaller vehicle. Seeing a single person driving a huge 1/2 or 3/4 ton truck or a large SUV seems a waste to me. But I guess to each their own. Just not my cup of tea.
Why would a 30-year-old “fad” die out, when it’s more of a return to the tall vehicles we used to have? What would make the average buyer want to return to low vehicles?
“What would make the average buyer want to return to low vehicles?”
Style. If low vehicles become fashionable again, watch the prices of used SUVs and CUVs plummet. As we students of automotive design well know, fashions don’t always make sense!
Why would a 30-year-old “fad” die out, when it’s more of a return to the tall vehicles we used to have
Used to have before that intervening 30+ year fad of lower vehicles, you mean? 😉
Regarding the 2019 LS, I believe someone around here made a comparison of it to a 1961 Plymouth Fury. I am starting to see it. Exner lives!
“Back To The Future” !
🙂
Despite of known not quite reliable, German bands, Mercedes, BMW and Audi, beat the Japanese luxury bands in US in last two decades. German bands have better products than thier US and Japanese counter parts. These days, in New York region, Mercedes S class and BMW 7 series are common sight. Some high end car service companies in NYC even use them as a service vehicle. More German car companies have full range of vehicles for consumers to choose, and Lexus needs to have more works on this aspect. And consumers also wants the band name, Lexus is not matching with the German cars in term of ego. More, in China, the world largest auto market, German luxury cars are the vehicle for those newly rich class.
You know, I’m going to be pretty damn blunt here. I’m surprised that the LS series even continued after the second generation because there’s no point in it. Now don’t get me wrong, I like the original fourth gen LS before it got refreshed with the spindle grille, but for the longest time I wasn’t even aware of Lexus continuing it.
For as revolutionary and important as the original Lexus LS400 was, it suffered the same problem a lot of cars like it suffer. Sure, it’s cool to shake up the market with a genuinely great product, but the problem is you start to deal with trying to make the new thing seem as genuinely exciting as it did before and the attempts to refresh it seem desperate to keep it relevant. The suicide door Lincoln Continental I would also argue suffered in this regard.
Yes the original LS400 was a great car, I don’t dispute it, it’s aged very well, and it proved a very important point that back then was still shrouded in a lot of doubt and skepticism. But the true car that really made Lexus what it is, is the original RX. The original RX paved the landscape for what we see today, it laid the groundwork for what would become the crossover, and it was and still is a massive hit. That car, along with the original Lincoln Navigator, would end up being cornerstones for the automotive market of now, and regardless of one’s own feelings on the current market, those two vehicles are the arbiters of what’s popular, what’s selling, and most importantly, what’s profitable. The LS series stopped being relevant, or even necessary, at around 1998 and I think Lexus only kept it around because they assumed the previous LS400 buyers would keep buying the LS. Not saying some of them didn’t, but I imagine they either moved onto something else or their next purchase from Lexus was an RX model.
True, Joseph.
It’s kinda like watching a rerun of the demise of the full-size coupe, in a way. The market really isn’t there and they’ll have to pull the plug eventually, but meanwhile they’re locked into continuing to have a presence in that market sector, however small it might be nowadays. And they can’t kill their flagship; it’s a matter of corporate pride, maybe with overtones of the Japanese concept of honour. For Toyota/Lexus to discontinue the LS would be such a loss of face.
The way I see it, they’ve tried everything they can stylistically, going to full-conservative with the third-gen, then loosening up progressively. But now the marketing guys say it’s time for a new one, so now they’re giving us full-radical.
Flailing around, trying to drum up sales. Wonder if we’re watching the death throes?
Great point about the RX really defining the Lexus of today, as well as setting a lasting market trend. True, the original LS was a great fusion of Japanese, European and American attributes, and was a true breakthrough that reshaped the market. But with RX, Lexus created the upscale, badge-engineered CUV that came to define the “soft roader” market. Such products now dominate from a broad cross-section of makers. As for prestige sedans, if it’s not from Silicon Valley (Tesla) or Germany, it simply isn’t perceived as being “the best.” No matter how good Genesis or Infiniti or Lexus products are, they lack the panache and bragging rights of the luxury brand leaders. Quasi-upscale soft roaders (the Buicks, Mercurys, Oldsmobiles of the 21st Century) quietly dominate a large and profitable market segment, and Lexus deserves credit for paving the way with the RX.
For those who are quick to criticize the new LS, I say it’s worth waiting to see one in person. In person, they have a lot of presence. Here’s one I snapped in motion — they look low and sleek.
Picture
Granted that looks nice – but it looks totally unrelated to the previous model. Unless I saw the front, I wouldn’t know it as a Lexus. Does that matter with prestige cars any more?
Does that matter, though? It has Lexus styling cues, such as the spindle grille, horizontally-oriented dash design, and the splayed-out taillights with L design elements. But it’s bigger.
Besides, the previous-generation LS eventually adopted a spindle grille. There’s some design continuity and, more importantly, familial resemblance to the rest of the Lexus line.
And the new ES looks like a baby LS. I don’t know what they’re going to do with the next GS (which may or may not actually arrive).
Agree, William!
Here’s another side view.
Oh wait….Never mind….this is my new “half priced Lexus” Toyota Camry.
If you’d actually seen both of these in the metal, you’d realize they don’t actually look that much alike.
But then following on from that logic, why buy a Benz S-Class when it looks so much like a base C-Class? What was the point in buying a Lincoln Continentals back in the day when the Mercury Marquis looked like them? Volkswagen and Audi design language isn’t markedly different so why buy an Audi when a Volkswagen Passat or Arteon looks similar? Etc etc.
The profile looks mature and elegant. While the nose looks Dragon Ball Z inspired. Like the design of the front is pandering to a fad.
Like two different cars.
My God, that BMW X7 . . . Have BMW designers seen a picture of a 1977 Cutlass Supreme? Because I assume they’d stop doing that to the front ends of new BMWs if they had.
If you could make a grille out of jumbo sized truck nutz, it would look like the new BMW’S.
As others have pointed out, these look completely different in person compared to photos, and one will take notice. They are huge sedans, yet they look so lithe and athletic relative to their actual size. And the interior is a left field knockout of design elements constructed from some astoundingly premium appearing and feeling materials. Your mind initially wants to think it can’t possibly work, yet it really does. Lexus still has it, no doubt in my mind, and if it weren’t for the “awful grill”, there would be little for people to point at to deride this LS’ excellence:
The interior is indeed stunning, especially with the kiriko glass trim.
Sedans may be a “dying breed” in North America, but that’s not the case in the rest of the world. There will be a new gen Lexus LS — though it may not make it to your shores, it will doubtless be popular in Japan and the rest of Asia. And that’s where the growth is, Chinese economics hiccups notwithstanding.