[FullyFunctional]

It’s a shame but I can see how it’s a harder sell than the nth iteration of a scene from say Harry Potter.

IMhO, they could do well by combining programmable elements with thematic sets, say add programmable motion to a haunted house. They have already tip-toed down this path, eg. the roller coaster has an optional motor function. However the pure approach of Mindstorm clearly has too narrow a market.

[dragonwriter]

They aren’t discontinuing it because its hard to sell in that space. They are retiring it in favor of their newer offering in the space (LEGO Education Spike Prime). They also have, for programmable robotics, the younger-kid focussed LEGO Boost. Plus they have at least one DUPLO set aimed at what I think of as the “tactile coding toy” space (where instructions are represented as physical configurations of objects), DUPLO Coding Express.

[lupire]

They are dropping the non-Edu line, as parent was talking about.

[FullyFunctional]

Exactly and it’s a quite obvious that if it sold well it wouldn’t have been dropped. Edu is a completely different market (for better and worse).

(We also have Boost but it’s much more limited IMO - my biggest gribe is that LEGO has so many incompatible systems which is ironic)