There used to be an "unspoken rule" in S that if someone made a locomotive the other manufacurers wouldn't try to step on the other's toes, mainly due to the relatively small market.
And that is my number 1 issue with S. Pretty much why I am passing time playing with my son on his O gauge layout until I see where S is going... It will need to change drastically in several ways if it is going to be a long term viable scale for me to model in. Time will tell. A 4449 and/or J would be a step in the right direction, but if Lionel /MTH did it and didn't do scale flanges I wouldn't be interested.
It's a brave, new S world.
Let's see what happens...
Rusty