BMW's last internal combustion engine rolls off the line in Germany

2023-11-14

Recently, the last internal combustion engine produced by BMW at its Munich plant in Germany officially rolled off the production line, a V8 engine. The plant will be upgraded and transformed into an Electric Vehicle production site in the future.

"It is fitting that BMW is dedicating the Munich plant to the production of electric vehicles.For more than 100 years, Munich has been BMW's headquarters and main plant, and the brand's most important and visible plant. This should drive the company into the future." Foreign media outlet The Drive commented.

Does this mean the end of BMW's internal combustion engine era? That's not so. In fact, the news isn't too surprising for the workers at the Munich plant. As early as 2020, BMW announced that it would transfer the internal combustion engine production work at the Munich plant to plants in Austria and the UK, which was transformed into an electric car plant, and BMW invested 400 million euros in this endeavour. Not long ago, Ika Horstmeyer, the BMW Group board member in charge of human resources, told the foreign press that the 1,200 skilled workers at the Munich plant who work on internal combustion engines have been retrained for their new roles within the company.
BMW

As planned, the BMW Steyr plant in Austria will continue to produce V8 engines codenamed N63 and S63. A number of models, including non-BMW cars, use these two engines. In addition, the Hamhall plant in the UK is currently the sole production site for BMW's new S68 high-performance V8 engine and all N74 V12 engines.

And now, along with the end of internal combustion engine production, the BMW Munich plant will be completely transformed into an electric vehicle production site. In fact, as early as October 2021, the plant has already begun production of the i4 all-electric coupé, and from 2025 it will produce the new BMW i3 (codenamed NA0). Subsequently, the BMW i3 Touring series wagon and the new BMW i4 will also join the production line in Munich.

BMW is investing heavily in electric vehicles. Just recently, BMW announced that it will invest 100 million euros in a new battery test centre at its plant in Wackersdorf, Germany, for testing high-voltage batteries and other electric drive components, which is expected to be operational as early as mid-2024.

In terms of effectiveness, in the third quarter of this year, the BMW Group sold about 620,000 units worldwide. Among them, the BMW and MINI brands sold 93,931 pure electric vehicles, a year-on-year jump of 79.6 per cent, and accounted for 15 per cent of total sales. If we look at the BMW brand alone, its pure electric vehicle sales jumped 100.3 per cent year-on-year. "As can be seen from pure electric vehicle sales, our pure electric products in particular benefited from the high global demand." Peter Norda, BMW Group board member responsible for customers, brands and sales, said.

Especially in the Chinese market, from January to September this year, the BMW Group sold 69,603 pure electric vehicles in China, up 232 per cent year-on-year. All along, BMW has attached great importance to the Chinese market, after the EU launched an anti-subsidy investigation on Chinese-made electric vehicles, BMW was also affected, and was asked to provide information about its iX3, which is produced in its Chinese factories and exported to the outside world. For this anti-subsidy investigation, BMW has always been opposed to the views of its chief financial officer Walter Mertle also worried that China may take retaliatory measures against European car companies. Electric vehicle charging service

At the same time, North America is also BMW's future to increase the market. In October, BMW North America and Rolls-Royce North America announced that owners of BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce all-electric vehicles in the United States and Canada using the Combined Charging System (CCS) will be able to charge their vehicles at designated Tesla Superchargers from early 2025 onwards. As part of the agreement, the BMW Group will also adopt Tesla's North American Charging Standard (NACS) for its new all-electric vehicles in the US and Canada from 2025. In addition, BMW North America recently said it will expand the reach of its EV charging service, ChargeForward, in the U.S., with a goal of covering 48 states to further increase its presence in the electric mobility space.

It's also worth noting that BMW has not given up on internal combustion engine vehicles, despite its massive investment in EVs. The company says it aims to still have a 50 per cent share of internal combustion engine vehicles in total sales by 2030.

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