It's no secret that Toyota makes good hybrids. The Prius is the bestselling dual powertrain car out there and the quality of the drivetrain has migrated to a host of other Toyotas. Unfortunately, when Toyota decided to build the CT 200h, things went wrong. The Lexus brand is one that prides itself on smoothness, an insulating experience, and broad capability. Problem is, the CT 200h does none of these things. It's small and fairly basic for a car that starts at $32,200. Even worse, its acceleration time of 10.6 seconds to 60 mph from standstill is dismal.

As a result, Lexus has been selling around 10,000 of these cars per year, less than it initially projected. Word was put out by Lexus' European boss, Alain Uyttenhoven, (and picked up by Autocar) that the company will replace the poor seller with a crossover SUV to join the NX and RX. In all likelihood, the SUV will be a subcompact model that will slot under the NX and look a lot like the LF-SA concept that we saw back at the 2015 Geneva Motor Show. The reason for the replacement choice is that Lexus is having a hard time establishing itself in Europe, where half of the luxury car market exists under the $45,000 mark. The LF-SA is poised to hit these targets and we'll be happy to see the CT 200h go as long as the LF-SA is an improvement.