RE: Tower really Futaba??
It's marketing, not volume of sales, that causes the Tower radios to be less-expensive.
The marketing folks over at the Empire determined that there's a niche for low-end, inexpensive equipement targeted at beginners. The most cost effective way for them to fill that niche is by using old designs. They don't want to use the Futaba brand name on old equipment, as that reduces the brand's prestige. So they slap a Tower badge on it, and they're able to maintain their higher margins on the Futaba-badged products.
Horizon has done this as well with their J-Line product.