Its not just accountants winning the battle against the engineers.

Until the end 80s, Mercedes was happily making TRULY luxury cars, marvelously designed and engineered, and it was pretty much the only game in town (BMW was much smaller, hardly a rival across all segments, Lexus, Infiniti, Acura, etc were not there). They had no incentive to be "efficient" in their manufacturing processes, so they made the best they could, put a "cost plus profit" price tag on it, and people bought it - they hardly had any choice.

Lexus, obviously, changed the rules of the game. Like all other Japanese manufacturers, they were far more cost efficient, and much more quality/reliability conscious. The result was that they produced luxury cars that were 20%-30% cheaper than their German rivals. Obviously many people switched.

Today, the reality is that in the 30-40K price segment, the lexuses and Acuras are far better cars than their German rivals - the Germans just do not have the efficiencies to manufacture a luxury car for 30K. 50K? maybe. 80K? Yes.

Japanese cars are getting better and better. German brands, especially Mercedes, is getting more and more diluted (Chrysler, etc.).

If Mercedes doesn't do something fast, they have a serious risk of losing their brand value, something they created over 100 years.

I drive an old mercedes, and there is nothing like that car. But the newer ones are really not as good. I used to be an ardent Mercedes fan, but really, other than emotional reasons, I cannot find enough reasons today to buy a new mercedes over a new japanese car (again, I am talking about the under 50K segment - above that is still a German stronghold, though it may not be so for long).

So its not just accountant hammering down on the engineers (BTW, I am an engineer myself, not an accountant!!). Its market realities, and the ability/inability of companies to react to it, and competition - when the field gets crowded, you just cannot afford to slacken anymore!!