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Acura bringing near-production-ready concept sedan to Pebble Beach

Three years ago Acura turned many heads with the Precision concept. Said to be the future of Acura design language, the latest RDX crossover is the most full-bodied expression of the Precision Crafted Performance design language. The rest of the range has only gone as far as the Diamond Pentagon grille. That looks to change later this year, when Acura brings a near-production-ready four-door to Pebble Beach that's inspired by the Precision. Car and Driver, which got a peek into Acura's Southern California design studio, says the tea leaves "point to a new production Acura sedan in the Precision concept's gorgeous 'four-door coupe' form." Believing the Pebble display will be "a tribute to the best of Acura's past" and could presage a flagship to replace the RLX, C/D wonders if the carmaker won't reach into its deep past and resurrect the Legend name. That's seems a bit much, but we have only six months to wait. After that, the next-generation TLX sedan and MDX crossover will arrive, and are expected to wear Precision cues. Both are scheduled to make landfall at the end of this year or beginning of next year. Based on shapes bulging under taut covers, C/D says both will receive stretched front intakes and "hook-shaped, extruded taillights." A juiced TLX Type S with a ducktail spoiler appears to lurk in the near future, too. Eventually, the second coming of the ZDX crossover might get the nod as well. Acura sold the severely rakish crossover coupe from 2009 to 2013, well before crossover coupes had established themselves. Looking at what's happened in the past 10 years, the ZDX was either ahead of its time, or consumers only want diminished rear headroom from German crossovers; no Japanese luxury maker has yet put a sloped roof on one of its crossovers. That means if a new ZDX does come, it could be just as novel the second time as it was the first.Related Video:

2014 Acura RLX

Earlier in the year, I reviewed a powder-blue Volkswagen Beetle Convertible, and I witnessed a group of high-school-aged girls ogling the car as it sat in my driveway. In my head, I found it to be a funny-yet-fitting scene that I didn't think of again until a 2014 Acura RLX showed up in my driveway. This time around, an elderly neighborhood couple stopped to give the big Acura sedan a closer look. The RLX is trying to shed past stereotypes of its predecessor, the Acura RL, just like the Beetle. Hoping to avoid becoming the de facto "grandpa car," Acura has completely reworked - and renamed - its flagship sedan.
As the bookend to the new entry-level ILX, the addition of the 2014 RLX might give Acura its strongest sedan lineup ever as the automaker looks to break the cycle of being a middle-of-the-road luxury brand. Stepping up to the big-boy table isn't going to be easy, though, as the competition keeps getting tougher. Forget cars like the Mercedes E-Class and BMW 5 Series, the Acura RLX is going to have its hands full with the likes of the Cadillac XTS, Lexus GS and Hyundai Genesis, not to mention a strong consortium of lower-priced, mid-luxury sedans like the Hyundai Azera, Toyota Avalon and Chevy Impala. The one thing all of these cars have in common is a reputation for being an old man cruiser.
I spent a week with the new RLX to see if it could shake the stigma of its outdated predecessor or if it would just leave me searching for the nearest early bird specials.

Honda spinning off Acura as stand-alone division in bid to wake up brand

Every major automaker has a different way of relating between its various divisions and brands. At Volkswagen, for example, the individual brands seem to operate with a large degree of autonomy. Under the Renault-Nissan Alliance, the two units share a common chief executive, but little else. The relationship between Honda and its luxury division Acura has always been rather close, but that's all about to change.
American Honda Motor Company has always handled sales and marketing in the North American market for both the Honda and Acura divisions, but new reorganization plans call for the two units to be separated under their own direction. Leading the Acura division will be Michael Accavitti, who moves into the position from his role as Senior Vice President for Auto Operations at American Honda. The Honda division will meanwhile be taken over by the current head of Acura sales, Jeff Conrad.
Both will report to John Mendel, the current executive vice president of the Automobile Sales Division that is being rebranded as the American Honda Auto Division. Unlike rivals Lexus and Infiniti - two brands that Acura beat to the market - Honda barely markets its luxury brand outside of North America. Its overseas presence is felt only in China, though we've yet to receive word on how the reorganization might effect that market - or for that matter, any potential of expanding into others.