Next Alternitys to be Sideswipe & Sunstreaker?

[SOUNDBLASTER]

Never reallty thought about that Zippo.. You are totally right there .

Bring on Alternity, Wildrider and breakdown

[Tober]

Aparently that photo has been there for a while.

Lambros would be nice tho...

[RageOnTheRoads]

Never reallty thought about that Zippo.. You are totally right there .

Bring on Alternity, Wildrider and breakdown

TOTALLY!!!!

Though I think particular image was just a placeholder picky for alternity bee or megs.

[nik27]

I was reading somewhere that lamborghini was owned by VW so chances of it actually being a lambo would be slim given the whole "no association with war machines" thing with VW. Hoping this is wrong though, sunstreaker alternity would be mint

[MV75]

They licensed it to a roadbot.....

[GoktimusPrime]

nik27: VW/Porsche and Automobili Lamborghini are separate companies - the former is German and the latter Italian. While VW/Porsche has long refused to licence their vehicles for "association with war" (meaning that with the exception of Disney Label, we've never had any VW/Porsche Transformers since G2), Lamborghini has not had such a policy. After all, Mach Alert (RiD Prowl) is a Lamborghini Diablo (as well as other variations and incarnations of that mould). The existence of Disney Label Donald Duck demonstrates that VW/Porsche hasn't outrightly refused their vehicles to Transformers, only to any toys associated with war (which is what VW has always said).

Universe/Henkei Sideswipe and Sunstreaker are both modified Lamborghini Gallardos; apparently modified to avoid legal conflicts, so it's possible that Hasbro were unable to obtain rights from Lamborghini but that doesn't mean that Lamborghini would continue to deny TakaraTOMY. For various reasons automobile companies will grant rights to one company but not the other, e.g.: Mercedes Benz allowed Takara to model Wild Ride on the ML320, but denied Hasbro; hence why the headlights and logo are changed on X-Brawn. Other times they will grant rights to both Hasbro and Takara but under different conditions for their respective markets, e.g.: Binaltech Prowl is a Honda Integra Type-R, but in North America this car is known as the Acura RSX so on Hasbro's Alternator Prowl the Honda logos were changed to Acura logos.

I'm not sure why Hasbro had difficulty obtaining full rights to the Lamborghini Gallardo for Universe, but without knowing the reasons behind this it doesn't necessarily mean that TakaraTOMY would be faced with the same issue.

[nik27]

Lamborghini is owned by Audi AG, which is 99.7% owned by Volkswagen AG

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_car_c...ns_Lamborghini

Not a totally perfect source but a source none the less. There is potential for Lambo to refuse to be associated with war machines given that they are owned by VW.

[GoktimusPrime]

It must have been a relatively recent acquisition/merger because the Mach Alert (Lamborghini Diablo) mould was used as recently as 2004. Although it would explain why HasTak were unable to acquire the rights to the Lamborghini Gallardo for Universe/Henkei.

Fascinating... <rubs.chin>

[Fungal Infection]

Audi has been part of VW since forever as a subsidiary and Lamborghini was acquired by Audi in 1998.

[GoktimusPrime]

In that case it seems unlikely to me that Lamborghini, even under Audi/VW have adopted VW/Porsche's stance on refusing to associate their vehicles with war since we the Mach Alert/RiD Prowl mould was used between by Takara and Hasbro, and Hasbro were not required to modify the mould for RiD (unlike with Wild Ride->X-Brawn).

Still, I am curious as to why Hasbro were unable to secure the rights for the Gallardo. Another curiosity is that Audi granted Paramount the rights to use the APR tuned Audi R8 for Sideways in Revenge of the Fallen, but Hasbro seemed to again have issues with the licensing because the Sideways toys are merely approximations of the R8, not replicas. So clearly Audi doesn't have an issue with associating their vehicles with war. Perhaps there's been other legal issues between Audi/Lamborghini and Hasbro?