ORIGINAL: t9dragon
Then explain why did HPI and Parma also stop making them?
Since Volkswagon long long ago sold the manufacturing rights, as well as the image, design and concept to the Mexican Goventment they haven't had any claims to the actual Beetle itself for like 30-something years. And since the Beetle itself is no longer in production literally nobody owns the rights to it.
And on top of that the BajaBug is not a true Beetle anyway, it's a Baja conversion that dozens of companies made kits and complete body kits for back in the 70s.
The only way an automobile manufacturer has any "legal claim" towards anything RC is when a company uses their name and/or logo in conjunction with a product. Associated's Kamino 18R body is a clear rip-off of a Subaru, there are several companies that make other so-called copycat ripoffs and none of them are getting sued either.
It used to be that almost all the RC body manufacturers used to make copies of cars and call them by name, but when the 1;1 manufacturers started asking for money for the use of the name of the car (Mustang, Barracuda, Chevrolet, Camaro, whatever) the body manufacturers just stopped using the names themselves. But the practice continues liberally today.