New Car Segment--Working or Not Working?

Before I drop the article on NBA Draft, let me stop by at the cars, which is another favorite of mine.

The car industry is on the rise- at least in Taiwan- in recent year or 2. Carmakers, domestic or international, are introducing new cars and exploring new opportunity in new segments like Colombus did to the Americas few centuries ago. Honestly, as a car fans, I won't say I hate to see this happening. But so many new offering also trigger my curiosity: Why the hell do we need so many "compact car"?

I can't tell the beginning of this, all I remember is the launch of X5 in 1999 and its big success in luxury SUV, despite its true identiy a "SAV". Then, all of a sudden, "Crossover" became meaningful in somewhere other than on basketball court. You'd see BMW X3, X6, X1; Audi Q7, Q5, Q5, and Mercedes-Benz M-Class, R Class all coming out in the efforts to gain ground in the trend of "Crossover". --Please be noted, all I'm mentioning here is merely the collection of crossover SUV, it's gonna take me a few more lines to list you all other crossover sedan, crossover coupé...

I'm not saying to developing new opportunity is a bad thing. It's understandable that everyone is trying to be the first to somewhere so he/she can take the advantage. We witness this throughout human history: the aforementioned Colombus discover the Americas and claim the continent theirs; gold diggers worked their life off trying to find the fortune in Gold Rush and to be the next rags-to-riches legend; even in modern days, silly Korean is trying so hard to claim every great findings, every phenomenon, or even outstanding athletes is by, from, or is Korean.

However, modern-day car industry is not the Americas, nor is it 19th-century gold mine in San Francisco. They are identical in some ways- like they are fiercely competitive, but, down to the basics, this is a business of feeding consumers' needs. So why the hell those masterminds come up with all this different, confusing car segments and try to convince us that those differences matter? How big a difference would lie between the owners of BMW X5 and X6? Audi A4 and A5? If it's not that I'm too dumb to distinguish, then it must be something wrong with carmakers..., and their research house.

It's ok to build your product portfolio, but look at BMW 5 Series Gran Turismo (I call it the Fran"kar"stein), what a disaster!!