Lexus Discontinues IS-F After Only Selling 11,000 Units Worldwide In Six Years

Actually is you consider the IS-F was available in Japan in 2007 you can argue 7 years of production.

I wonder if the new generation will get the F treatment or if they will keep it for the RC only for now?

Lucky buyers at least have a technical classic on their hands

In 50 years will be a classic as long as the owners realize that and don't trash them.

Was the IS-F their (alleged) "3-series killer"?

BTW, my comment isn't intended to be disrespectful to Lexus. I just recall Lexus making claims to challenging the 3, and I was wondering if this was the car that was to do that.

Like so many things Lexus, the IS F was a half-hearted attempt to outdo BMW M and Mercedes-AMG. An 8/10ths performance vehicle built with a check-the-box mentality.

Nothing about it screams "sell my soul" to buy this, and nothing about the IS F was really better than the real deal M- or AMG vehicles.

The new RC-F? Old wine in new bottles.

I'm not sure if I would call if half hearted (yeah I said that). The problem it two part.

1. The Japanese are great at taking a snapshot and matching it. It is the way they have built their entire production process since WWII. I see this and I will copy it. (the Koreans are the same BTW)

2. The problem is the performance snapshot is 3 to 5 year old when it hits production.

In the mean time BMW has moved on and improved 3 to 5 times since then. So Lexus debuts a capable sedan based on a 3 to 5 year old competitors performance. Then they wonder what happened.

At this point the Japanese can not move as fast as the Germans so they are typically 2 to 3 steps behind. They basically are in the same place the American automakers were in the 70's and 80's too big and too slow.

9 I believe that the Japanese are behind for a reason. Yes they snapshot their competitors and match or better them. I would be willing to bet this IS outperforms the last M3. They are learning~ The new RC-F is going to be interesting because it has so much more Hp with an aspired 8. I truly believe BMW dropped the ball with that one; probably intentionally conspiracy theory. Lexus has been on BMW's tail for some time now and have bested them already in performance some ways. BMW is giving its turbo tech to Lexus and once the 600 tt motors come out it's game on~! "Thanks to BMW"

The question is, does the IS-F even make sense when the RC-F with 450hp goes on sale this fall?

It does not - Hence the pulling the plug.

However does only 11,000 units shock anyone?

Since it debuted in Japan in 2007 that means it only sold a bit over 1500 units a years worldwide.

Which is fine if your are a boutique maker, which they are not.

Combine that with how slow the LF-A has sold (there are still new 2012 ones in Autotrader.com) And you really wonder if Lexus can ever be considered a performance brand at all.

Selling slow has "nothing" to do with being a performance brand. That has more to do with marketing.

Corvette ZR1 could sell because there are patriotic Americans. Who else do you think would buy those? And I don't think it sold a lot as far as I remember.

But then again, we live in a completely unfair world where the Europeans dominate the whole luxury brand market.

"we live in a completely unfair world where the Europeans dominate the whole luxury brand market."

do tell us how it's unfair. it's a free market last time i checked. except for japanese manipulation of their currency to help along their car makers.

@JDMUSMuscle - Toyota has always placed emphasis on volume not image.

Look at the image cars they have dropped over the years due to slow sales, MR2, Supra, & Celica. All were unique and image cars and were killed off due to sales. Also name a convertible Toyota has kept around for any length of time?

Part of the problem they have is they feel all models should be profitable, nothing is a halo car.

Cars are nothing more than appliances and transportation tools. I do not treat cars like babies, I treat them like machines that are meant to function for me.

The European brands' vehicles fail to impress most people in terms of reliability and yet, thanks to their marketing strategy and all the hype that they create, they have succeeded in turning their car brands into something iconic, and also something that is the ultimate status symbol.

But in reality, Mercedes or Lexus, they both are not all that different. Someone said "Open and close the door of Audi, you will see the meaning of luxury"

But frankly, I don't give a rat's butt about it. I'd rather just buy a used Food pick up truck than buy something like Mercedes-Benz S class. Less maintenance, cheaper and I do not end up looking like a poser as well.

And something like fast cars? Well, yes, I like fast cars. Like Mustang and Challenger. But why put "performance" into a luxury car like Mercedes, BMW, etc? And why go into something like it so deeply, when any car can be fast with less money and tuning anyway?

After all, Lexus IS-F failed not because it is a bad sports car. It failed because of all those hype over the European brands.

In reality, Lexus IS-F most likely performs the same like an M3 or better and more interesting to drive.

009 Just because LFA's listed on eBay does not mean those cars have not already been purchased as obviously they have. Drrrr~

this was expected once the new IS launched in 2013 and they kept selling the ISF with the old body. and it didn't make sense to keep making a $60,000 car that only sold 11,000 units in 6 years.

Just to clarify the inflammatory "discontinued after only selling 11k units" headline, the IS-F they just stopped production of was actually still based on the previous generation IS, not the new one that came out last year. So are they truly "discontinuing" the IS-F completely? Or are they just stopping production of the existing IS-F until they release the new IS-F based on the current IS architecture?

I was truly shocked at how low the volume was considering the IS-F was to take bite out of M3 sales. The IS-F was introduced in 2008 when the auto industry was is the dumps, I did find that BMW sold 18,000 M3 models that year.