there would have been a lot of design time spent on this guy, incorporating electronics, Designing around the insane transformation requirements.
Size isn't really a factor in the cost of a toy, yes, more plastic costs more, but it's pretty cheap stuff.

The real costs are in parts count, individual mould size, Engineering time, prototyping, inspection and assembly.

this guy looks like he's going to be very complex, so costs would probably be driven by parts count, which leads to bigger moulds (requiring bigger, higher pressure injection machinery). Assembly time will also be longer with so many parts and the complexity of adding in the electronic features.

I still think the price is a bitter pill to swallow, especially when they should be expecting to sell a lot of these. I can't help but feel that Takara are banking on the characters popularity, with a fairly large profit margin.

I like beast wars, the only beast wars toys I have are the recent Generations Waspinator and Rhinox and the first MP releases of each existing character. I would like to have an MP Beast wars shelf but man this is a big pill.