Lexus Studying the Possibility of a Prestige Pickup

By adpock - December 7, 2015

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What do you think of when you hear the words “luxury pickup truck”? Nothing, right? Even though some auto makers have tried to make it one, the concept doesn’t really even register as a thing, does it? Well, that might change, if a recent Lexus “study item” gets past the studying stage.

According to Motoring, who spoke to Lexus product planning leader Makoto Tanaka, a prestige ute is one of the “study items” that the marque has been looking at developing. Albeit, it’s the “least possible” of all the current items on the list, which also includes a seven-seater RX and a compact SUV that would slot below the hot-selling NX.

Perhaps the sudden interest in a luxury pickup stems from Mercedes-Benz’s plan to release their GLT-Class ute outside of the U.S. in 2019 or so. The GLT-Class will be based on the Nissan Navara and will be lighter and sleeker than one of those “Fat cowboy truck[s] for North America,” as MB Vans chief Voker Mornhinweg described it.

So perhaps there is a market share there. Especially since the platform already exists in the new Toyota HiLux (shown below, along with a couple of Lexus pickup renders), which, as Digital Trends points out, is “a model sold outside the U.S. that is famous for its toughness, and infamous for its use by extremist groups like the Taliban and ISIS.”

So there’s that to consider too.