I am curious about the decision recently to release variants on existing sculpts; what’s the thought process behind additional sculpts of the same mini verses new sculpts?
There's long been a practice of mixing variants in with completely new builds. Some have taken the route of extra parts in the blister (Banshee), or alternate parts to be purchased separately (3050 omnis), or complete minis (PP Locust and Osts come to mind as being on the odd side). Likewise, there are a number of different reasons variant sculpts are pursued. Some are special packs like the Bounty Hunter, Sword & Dragon, or con releases. When I've worked on the con packs, I've tried to add value by changing pose, working on the overall look, or including parts that could increase the appeal of what might otherwise be seen as just another variant of X. That in itself has ended up generating a few "extra" minis. In other cases, new art or a new variant in print may spike interest in a sculpt that just hasn't held up well (see the first generation of 3055 minis for multiple examples; the Huron Warrior and Battle Hawk got way better sculpts the second time around). For a more recent example, the P-Hawk IIC project ended up being nearly a full resculpt to trim some of the proportions on the earlier PP version and bring it more in line with other minis of similar weight. Still more sculpts can be the result of fan financing getting behind a project that otherwise might not be a prime candidate, or even the LD having something he feels could benefit from an update (the Mongoose for one - for a long time it's been good 'Mech with blah looks). Don't know if that answers your question or not; I'm not privy to every decision, so for many specifics I simply won't know where it stemmed from.