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It is not just the market, it is the people and infrastructure too. Think about that for a moment, you are trained as a mechanical engineer. You know about mot

It is not just the market, it is the people and infrastructure too. Think about that for a moment, you are trained as a mechanical engineer. You know about motors, transmissions and all the complexity involved in creating a combustion engine car, like handling fluids, pumps and so on. Now, you are going to take a decision that destroys engines, your new cars are not going to have engines. Transmissions are extremely simple or do not exist. The entire car does not need to resist the forces of the engine and transmission. No pumps and brakes last the entire life of the car. This means mechanical engineers are not needed, and you already have them. Under German law, it is extremely difficult to let them go, and they are your pals,btw. The infrastructure of cars is extremely expensive, several 1000s millions of dollars per plant. This is amortized in decades. If you buy a thousand lathes that make pieces for 20 years and after 10 years demand for those pieces disappear... your lathes cost at least double. But the most important thing: Germany is good making mechanical things, but not the leader in batteries or electronics, Japan, US, Taiwan and China are.

mikedh 7y ago
Electric cars still require mechanical engineers, and probably a similar number of them to an IC car. Except for the engine itself, most things are not engineered in-house, suppliers like Bosch/ZF/etc provide components to specs.
- systemBuilder 7y ago
  Most car companies today are really engine companies. They stamp and weld the bodies and build the engines and everything else is out sourced. EVERYTHING ELSE! So the original commenter is correct they would have to lay off half their people to convert to electric motors.
  - cheerlessbog 7y ago
    In what business is the opportunity to reduce payroll a disincentive to investment? At worst they can be paid to retire.
cheerlessbog 7y ago
It sounds almost as if you are arguing that BMW does not want to invest heavily in EV because the cost of labor is not high enough. That's absurd. The logical conclusion is that they should pay them to retire.

mikedh 7y ago

Electric cars still require mechanical engineers, and probably a similar number of them to an IC car. Except for the engine itself, most things are not engineered in-house, suppliers like Bosch/ZF/etc provide components to specs.

systemBuilder 7y ago
Most car companies today are really engine companies. They stamp and weld the bodies and build the engines and everything else is out sourced. EVERYTHING ELSE! So the original commenter is correct they would have to lay off half their people to convert to electric motors.
- cheerlessbog 7y ago
  In what business is the opportunity to reduce payroll a disincentive to investment? At worst they can be paid to retire.

cheerlessbog 7y ago

It sounds almost as if you are arguing that BMW does not want to invest heavily in EV because the cost of labor is not high enough. That's absurd. The logical conclusion is that they should pay them to retire.