Subaru’s technical boss has said out loud what enthusiasts have been muttering for the best part of a decade. Boring. Except Tetsuro Fujinuki did not mean the cars — he meant the way they were dreamed up: one review meeting, then another, and then almost the same slides all over again.
“We decided to stop doing things the old way. Because it’s boring,” Fujinuki said.
This was not a throwaway line for an interview. The shake-up is already written into the org chart: since April 1, 2026, Subaru has been running a Product & Portfolio Innovation Division, and inside it sits a separate Sports Vehicle Planning Office, a unit dedicated to planning sports models. The division itself is confirmed by the company’s own corporate filing, while its link to future performance cars comes from Japan’s BestCar.
Why now? According to Fujinuki, emissions rules and fleet-average fuel economy left no room for more powerful petrol versions for years. Growing hybrid and EV sales loosened that noose, and the performance projects finally got some air.
The new approach means more digital engineering and fewer intermediate sign-offs. Fujinuki insists development has already sped up and that his engineers are making bolder calls. The proof will be three manual-gearbox sports cars Subaru has promised by 2027, aimed first and foremost at the Japanese market.
Here is the line-up. First, a production WRX with a six-speed manual. Second, a more extreme take on the rear-drive BRZ. Third, and by far the most intriguing, a five-door sports hatchback: the production evolution of the Performance-B STI concept from the 2025 Japan Mobility Show. Fujinuki himself calls it an “affordable base car”. Sounds modest. That is usually how the best stories start.
That hatch is also tied to the High Performance X Version II race car: a 2.4-liter turbocharged FA24 boxer, all-wheel drive, a six-speed manual, 364 PS (359 hp) and 475 Nm. Subaru has not promised to carry those numbers over to a road model — but plenty of people are already doing the maths on its behalf.
Even so, an entire office outweighs another concept car. Subaru has shown plenty of pretty prototypes over the years, and almost none of them reached a production line. Now responsibility for performance products is locked into the company structure. Nothing is official yet about a new WRX STI generation, the hatchback’s output, or sales of the trio outside Japan. The next checkpoint is the reveal of the first production car from this programme. Not another show prototype.
