Roland seriously needs FP-90 replacement with their new Hybrid Grand action, but I doubt they will make it.
Well, that depends. One could argue that they don't need one that much.
Looking at this market segment:
The P515 isn't much of an ES8 killer, so Kawai have fixed their weight issue, and tidied things up with the action issues, done a series of minor upgrades but nothing substantially has improved eg, no improvement in action grade.
That to me tells you something about what Kawai think about the P515 (they think it's no revolution), and thus, Kawai have targeted those elements of their design which were slightly less competitive (weight, string sounds, amplification) and tidied around the edges (fixed action issues), gone for a more modern look, and hey presto, they are competitive with the P515. Kawai haven't felt the need to raise the bar on things that they are already doing well at (no action upgrade or sample update on the A-pianos).
Yes, the P515 is way better than the P255, but it doesn't seem like Yamaha tried to force the other two manufacturers to massively up their game.
Roland's next upgrade will probably include the same sound engine as they put into the LX708. Roland will need to improve the on board amplification a bit, but the PHA50 action is very competitive still. Probably Roland might want to shed some weight also. It's possible that they might include some arranger rhythm/accompliment patterns like Kawai - - - presumably Kawai were responding a bit to the Casio PX-S-3000, which Major's in arranger functionality to make up for it's action.
So all in all, I imagine Roland will look at the uptake figures for the ES920 for the next 18 months, and decide what level of upgrade /update to pitch at the market.
One problem Roland have is that their modelled sound really does need a thwacking great amplification system to get the best out of the sound. It's definitely worth them building Roland powered monitors (like the Nord Grand monitors), to offer supplementation to whatever on board amplification they manage to achieve. I would in their position do exactly that.
Also, me thinks they need to improve the headphone amp and try to address the boxy nature (compressed sound) that seems to plague the Rd2000 and LX708, both of which I felt were less competitive than the ES8, Nord Grand, and CLP685. Currently when you compare the Roland sound with the other offering, the sound clarity of the Roland for me just doesn't compete (putting aside the modelled tone characteristics and the dynamic control).
It doesn't really matter if you have terrific control over the dynamics of the modelled piano sound if that sound has a compressed dynamic range which symptomatically comes accross as boxy and lacking sound fidelity /clarity.
So, whilst there is a lot to improve on the Roland FP-90, they need to access how the ES920 sells, and Roland need to fix their shortcomings to win back market share.
In my experience with the LX708, Roland failed to compete in the cabinet piano market with the CLP685, and they don't want to fail to compete in the portable market with their next upgrade too. Indeed, the sound clarity of the binaural sampling and Yamaha's amplification system pushed out the bar beyond their competitors ability to compete, and I think it will be 5 years before Roland and Kawai close the amplification and sound clarity gap, even though the Kawai sample tone is more nuanced.
