I think Mazda pushed the RX-8 into production too quickly as they already overstated HP in it and now the engines are prone to failure - Mazda maybe a neat little automaker but they just don't have the resources to push an engine technology that is not widely accepted. For instance up unil the 2.3 liter in the Mazda 3, Mazda used the FSDE/FSZE engines for over 15 years - it was on many Fords too after Ford bought them. The rotary development team was discontinued and some engineers kept the program alive in a garage on their own dime (this is not much development for a production engine). Mazda quickly revived it with spurred sales and the "zoom zoom" marketing that they put the engine into production too quickly to figure out the longevity based problems which we are seeing now leading to such a major recall.