A Japanese report says two Mazda patent applications detail a compact front-engine, rear-wheel-drive two-seat open sports car — with doors that open like nothing Mazda currently builds: a "flip-up side door" whose rear edge swings outward and upward, in the manner of a supercar's butterfly doors. Nothing on the MX-5 Miata — the Roadster, in Japan — opens anything like that.
Before the speculation: what the filings actually show.
The technical substance
According to the report, the two filings cover the door mounting area and the surrounding body structure. The drawings depict a two-seater with its engine mounted longitudinally up front, driving the rear wheels. The structural content appears to address the demands created by the unusual door arrangement: the reported frame layout ties the hinge-pillar area to the front suspension mounting points through multiple frame members, distributing suspension loads into the pillar and the center of the body while limiting the weight of additional reinforcement.
That is a real engineering problem to be solving. Open cars already require extra reinforcement, and an upward-opening door places its own demands on the hinge structure — which makes this level of attention to the area read like more than a doodle.
What the filings do not say
No model name appears in the filings. Response raises both the next-generation Roadster and a production derivative of the Iconic SP concept as possibilities, and identifies neither as the subject. Worth remembering on top of that: the Iconic SP has never been formally confirmed for production, and carmakers routinely file patent applications for designs that never reach the road.
So the honest read is narrower but still interesting: if the report characterizes the filings accurately, Mazda is exploring body structures for a compact FR open two-seater with a door arrangement it has never put into production. Which future product that work lands in — if any — is a question the filings do not answer. Given what the Roadster means to this company, though, structural R&D in exactly this package is the least surprising thing Mazda could be spending patent money on.