It’s worse for business if you don’t know that the machine will be a massive seller and drive a load of additional impact to your brand. But in this case, it’s obvious that would happen. A new Octatrack basically leads to a free marketing campaign conducted by Elektron’s customers. Everybody wins.
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It‘s a common strategy to have a flagship product (at breakeven or even lossmaking) to to increase appeal of lower-tier products.
That being said, I doubt Elektron would incur any losses if they’d release a flagship stereo sampler with upgraded sequencer and Overbridge (be it called Octatrack or otherwise).
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The only thing I think Elektron will release in this vein will be a Digitakt MkII with stereo sampling, bigger memory, more storage, larger pitch range and a much better PC librarian. All in the same box as the MkI. DT is now over six years old.
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From a business POV, isn’t it silly from a company to know that “everybody wants one” and not releasing it?
Unless the expression “everybody wants it” includes themselves and is a confession like “we’d like to … but we can’t” 
That and the fact that what an OT3 “should” be is defined differently by every person that wants one. I personally would want Overbridge, don’t care about the multiple inputs, want improved effects, and want some real streamlining to the sampling and looping processes. But those would break a lot of existing OT users’ workflows. There has to be somebody here loves pickup machines, I’m sure 
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I agree that it would make sense as a product that would drive sales for their less expensive boxes. I would love to see a MK3 or (more likely) a spiritual successor, but again that’s not the business side we’re talking about here. At the same time I understand why Elektron has focused on the Digi form factor so much versus the big flagships. In any case this is all speculation without having access to direct sales numbers, and how a hypothetical MK3 would do. I would hope it’s a massive seller for them and that Elektron keeps producing the flagship products.
“Everyone wants one” and “everyone will buy one” are very different statements. Everyone wants a Ferrari, but how many, even if they had the money, would buy one? But I generally agree with you. Perhaps Elektron see the increased success of the smaller boxes as a larger potential gain than going after the flagship market where you will have a smaller overall customer base, but they will be more passionate and engaged.
Also the market is very down right now, everyone seems to be tightening their belts. I could see a company wanting to hold out a little longer to release something into potentially more favorable economic situations.
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There is something special about the Octatrack, it’s the fact that every user could focus on one side of it. It could be a very solid midi sequencer, a nice stereo sampler player, a big FX box with a sequencer, a performance mixer with crazy real time sound shaping, a powerful real time live remixing machine, etc…
When I had it, I sometimes used it as a midi sequencer and often as a real time live remixing machine. But never used all the other possibilities. So it was a machine overcomplicated for my use and in a way, overpriced. So, personally, I would be glad to see new digiboxes that focus on a certain side. A 4 tracks looper/realtime sampler with sequencer in digi format for example would be a dream product for me.
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IMHO it’s impossible for Elektron to cater to everybodys demands what a MK3 should be, so they are doomed to disappoint should they ever dare to attempt.
They would pretty much have to design a jack-of-all-trades, something as feature-rich as the MPCX but in the elektron way, with a crossfader. And I really expect a good portion of the OT fanbase would probably hate something like this.
“We didn’t ask for a daw-inabox, we just wanted overbridge.”
No, I think keeping it simple is the way to go. More focused Digiboxes. That said, I wouldn’t mind a DT-MK2 with live-looping and sample-streaming 
Crossfader could be a rotary…
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Don’t touch my crossfader!
The benefit is ultrafast waka waka fx!
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I would love to see something with the sample slicing stuff on the octatrack but the usability of the digitakt and a crossfader, maybe an effect per track too.
Secondarily I would also love a device that combines sequencing and mixing kinda like the octatrack, but more seamless, and with more inputs, where each track is basically a thru track with its own midi channel out so you could sequence external stuff and effect it all on the same sequencer track. But the crossfader is also critical here too.
Basically I think there are like 3 or 4 different devices that could be derived and refined from the functionality of the octatrack.
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I don’t think the demands are much more than a few upgrades on the current version. It seems most of the complaints could be answered with OB and improved effects.
My wishlist:
- Per track level indicators. Or at least clipping indicators. Something to make mixing easier.
- Upgraded converters
- Dedicated master channel (although you get something similar by attaching an AH to the end.
- Something like instrument definitions for midi channels.
I write this but a new octa is not happening anyway
I just sold my MK1 (for a second time) hoping that in a years time, a mkiii will appear
IHOP makes other dishes besides pancakes but they would never stop selling pancakes because pancakes pay the bills.
Elektrons Pancake is the Digitakt… and a DT2 only makes sense.
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I don’t know how relevant this is necessarily, but the OT sits at No.9 in Thomann’s sales rank chart for samplers -
That’s seems really not bad at all considering it’s a 12 year old design with a 1.3k price tag.
Digitakt is listed in drum machines as No.5 , so tricky to judge where it would sit compared to the OT but I’m guessing drum machines are generally more popular than samplers.
I really hope they will come up with something like the octatrack, improving it and making it more streamlined. The octatrack is great and loved, and Digitakt fills the “more accessible” niche so I dont know if they’ll actually make a new sampler product at this point in time. Digitakt MK2 with stereo samples would be great, thats the only reason why I don’t like that one…
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the question here is not what, but when…
For a business model it’s better to release 7 (Seven) smaller boxes consecutively or release 6 smaller boxes and then a single flagship model? I think the latter…
From a logistics and operations perspective, it’s better to reuse the design, development, manufacturing, and shipping/sales benefits of a single platform that can host multiple products over time. Witness the form factor of Digitakt, Heat, Digitone, and Syntakt. Korg, Roland, and Sonicware have done similar. Not to mention that in the age of YT, TikTok, and Twitch, more affordable and physically smaller devices mean more customers.
I’m not saying I want all that, just answering the question with my thoughts.