When the The A90 Toyota Supra finally arrived on the scene as a production vehicleopponents immediately came out of the woodwork to hate it sharing a BMW platform. Forget it Toyota has set the specifications for its chassisforget it engineers in Japan took care of the final coordination – there is a BMW logo on the oil filter, which means the car is terrible. Well, now signs point to the Supra’s demise in the next two years. I hope you are happy.
A report from Automotive News claims the Supra will become extinct by 2026, next to the BMW Z4, when production ends at Magna Steyr’s Austrian factory. Datum BMW’s unwillingness to give the Z4 another chanceit sounds like toyota will have to build a next generation supra itself – something that seems unlikely given the reluctance to build coupes without a partner. You’ve won, haters: the car you despise because it’s part German will now be completely dead. Is that better?
There is some hope for a continuation of the Supra line, and it comes from one of Toyota’s most dedicated gearheads: Tetsuya Tada himself. During the first launch of the A90 Supra, Tada-san said Japanese nostalgic car that an A100 would be on the table – ultimately:
“The A100 will come one day, but the taste will probably be very different,” Tada-san replied. “It could be an electric car, or an autonomous car, or a Formula E car. Who knows. The A100 could take the Supra name in a drastically different direction. Definitely different from the line of the A70 and A80.”
He then turned the conversation back to his mentor. “I want to continue Suzuki-san’s wishes, but if I pass the baton to a new engineer, I don’t know what will happen.”
When the time comes for the A100, Tada-san will probably retire.
If you all hated the beautiful ZF 8HP gearbox that the Supra came out with, how about an electric version? An autonomous version? In the search for some kind of purity, some imagined perfection, you let a fantastic car slip through your fingers.
