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TMG still developing Lexus LS Sports 650 [w/video]

If you're going to make a super sedan, you'd better do it in Germany. That's where Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz do it, along with third parties like Alpina, Brabus and G-Power, among others. Deutschland is the epicenter of the movement, regularly churning out the most powerful four-door rockets in the world. It's also where one of the racing divisions for Toyota has been hard at work on the TMG Sports 650.
Toyota Motorsport GmbH started with a Lexus LS and turned it into a 641-horsepower, twin-turbocharged super sedan it revealed late last year at the Essen Motor Show. But though we haven't heard much about it since then, the team behind Toyota's F1 and Le Mans efforts are apparently still hard at work on the project.
Speaking with Lexus' own UK blog, TMG chief Alastair Moffitt revealed that the project started way back in 2010, shortly after Toyota shut down its F1 program and left the racing team with nothing to do. The 5.0-liter twin-turbo V8 was initially producing as much as 800 horsepower, but has since been refined to 650 so that it could theoretically be put into production and onto the road.

Toyota settles first wrongful death suit related to unintended acceleration

Toyota's sales seem to have rebounded from the unintended acceleration issues from 2009 and 2010, but the automaker is far from done dealing with this situation. Following a settlement worth up to $1.4 billion for economic loss to affected vehicle owners, Toyota has settled rather than going to trial in a wrongful death lawsuit stemming from an accident in Utah in 2010 that left two passengers dead. This isn't the first case in which Toyota has settled, but it was the first among a consolidated group of cases being held in Santa Ana, CA.
According to The Detroit News, this case was scheduled to take place next month, and it was for a November 2010 incident in which Paul Van Alfen and Charlene James Lloyd were killed in a Camry when, based on findings by the Utah Highway Patrol, the accelerator got stuck causing the car to speed out of control and hit a wall; the terms of the settlement were not announced.
The article says that while Toyota will settle on some cases, it doesn't plan on settling on all of them as it still wants to be able to "defend [its] product at trial." This will probably be the case in suits claiming that software for the drive-by-wire accelerator was the cause of an accident in a Toyota or Lexus vehicle. The question of whether or not the electronic accelerator played any role in this problem has been a hot-button topic since the beginning. Toyota has issued recalls in the past to attempt to prevent unintended acceleration caused by trapped floor mats and faulty accelerator pedals, but it also says driver error was to blame in some instances.

Production Lexus NX leaked in Jim Lentz presentation?

Before kicking off the Detroit Auto Show, the Society of Automotive Analysts had Toyota CEO Jim Lentz come on stage to say some words about the future of the auto industry, as well as what's coming for Toyota. While this type of information would normally stay off our radar, a video of his speech likely gives us our first look - albeit low-res - at the production version of the Lexus NX compact crossover.
In the video recorded by AmericaJR, Lentz refers to the turbocharged LF-NX Concept that was on display at the Tokyo Motor Show, but comparing this image to our gallery from Tokyo, there are clear differences between the two vehicles. These include the toned-down shape of the spindle grille, lower fascia crease and door mirrors as well as a headlight design that more closely resembles that of the 2014 IS sedan and the newly introduced RC coupe. From what we can see of the rest of this image, the NX should retain some of the LF-NX's angular side body creases. The vehicle you see above basically looks ready for production.
If this is in fact the NX, then reports of a Geneva debut for the luxury crossover seem even more accurate. The entire video is posted below, but the NX comes on screen around the 10:40 mark.