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"Eight years ago, it looked like BMW was positioning itself in a good place for the electric future." No, it didn't. They had a single, sub-brand model (the i

by rsync 7y ago

"Eight years ago, it looked like BMW was positioning itself in a good place for the electric future." No, it didn't. They had a single, sub-brand model (the i3) that was neither technologically interesting nor performant. "It founded BMW i, a sub-brand to bring electrified products to its dealers" I didn't want a cutesy little i-car. I wanted an electric 7-series. There have been three model iterations of the 7-series since the Model S was revealed ... and they have nothing to show for all of that time. To auto makers: We don't want your electric car, we want your car, electric. "... BMW’s current plans as reported by InsideEVs, which include keeping the 6-year-old i3 around for a few more years and canceling the i8 entirely." The i8 was not an electric car - it was a a hybrid car with a little chainsaw engine inside that had worse performance than (I believe) even a base spec Tesla 3 series (for example). There was never a serious strategy and there were was a single (silly) e-mobile/i-car. I repeat: We don't want your "electric car", we want your car, electric.

cnasc 7y ago
> No, it didn't. They had a single, sub-brand model (the i3) that was neither technologically interesting nor performant. The i3 didn’t exist 8 years ago. What BMW did have then, and for some time before, was essentially a test fleet of electric 3-series sedans. They had a graphic applied to the sides so you could tell it was one of them. Those were essentially what you’re asking for, and what the article says was poised to be a sensible strategy. For whatever reason they decided to do the i sub brand instead, and that’s where there strategy makes no sense.
- tdiggity 7y ago
  People loved these too. The problem was that you couldn’t buy the car after the lease was up, bmw wanted them all back to destroy.
  - foepys 7y ago
    Maybe they wanted them back to study the parts? It's a completely new type of vehicle for them so they might have wanted real world data about the components.
    - tdiggity 7y ago
      Yea, that could be. At the time, the Leaf was just released, and The Tesla model S was on the verge of being delivered. To consumers, it felt like BMW wasn’t listening to their customers. We just wanted a normal car that had an electric drivetrain and reasonable range. When the i3 debuted, its styling skewed towards the Leaf/Prius. A lot of people didn’t want a car that stood out like that. I think a not-insignificant part of Tesla’s success was that the Model S looks pretty normal.
  - netsharc 7y ago
    I've had the pleasure of driving them through DriveNow (BMW's car sharing program). Fun little cars!
  - cnasc 7y ago
    Yep, one of my friends was in the program for that. He was permitted to get a special edition i3 right when they launched in lieu of being able to buy the car off-lease.
- jordanbeiber 7y ago
  I’m guessing guarding the quarterly vs committing to a very expensive long term strategy. Only makes sense for individual execs and shareholders short term. I remember Tesla being heckled for how difficult it is to build cars. Only Tesla didn’t build grandpa’s cars, they did what BMW should have done - create something new, something that will always be an expensive venture. Also, the diesel cheating probably ties in a bit here? Unsure about BMW specifically, but in general that’s what it looks like to me. Cheap and simple. No one knows about it and it will keep the diesel sales reasonable for quite a while. All about the short term.
netfl0 7y ago
I hear you but I would like something new. The closest concept that tickled my fancy was the Bollinger B1. It was close but it was missing something as simple as airbags. I want a utility vehicle I can spray out with a hose, throw kayaks in, and seat 5 adults. For 30K, please?
- skykooler 7y ago
  I'm hoping that Rivian will create a more budget vehicle at some point down the line.
mffnbs 7y ago
I agree wholeheartedly with your “we want your car electric” line of thinking. I hate when electric cars try to look like what someone thought an electric car should look like. No one wants that.
- benj111 7y ago
  On the other hand an IC car has a big heavy engine and compact fuel tank. An EV is the opposite so I think some experimentation is warranted.
entee 7y ago
CFRP was interesting technology. I don’t know enough about how new it was, but building it out as an industrial process at that scale was potentially quite useful. At the time (2013) there was what? The volt, the Model S. That’s pretty much it remotely in the same class of essentially purpose built EV or partial EVs. The Model 3 was 4 years away. Of those the i3 makes a ton of sense. It was a legit good start for a electrification strategy. If BMW has kept investing in this, could they have gotten a model that was basically as good as a model 3? Maybe maybe not, but it would have been interesting to see. Would it have been better than an iPace? Most likely, the weight advantage might have added maybe a few tens of miles at least. The point of the article is that BMW had a good start, did nothing, is now behind. And is now compounding the error by doubling down on doing nothing.
- fmajid 7y ago
  The model S outsold its German equivalents 2:1. If that wasn’t a wake-up call, I don’t know what is. Are they even capable of engineering anything other than emissions-fraud software any more? The hideous i3 was so unpopular LA dealerships were giving one away for free with each fully-loaded 3 or 4 series purchase (so they would get Corporate off their backs on i3 sales quotas). More generally BMW’s entitled customer-hostile attitude shows with their decision to turn Apple CarPlay into a pay-forever subscription feature. No wonder their sales are I just sold my 2013 335i, and whatever car I get next won’t be a BMW.
audunw 7y ago
> I repeat: We don't want your "electric car", we want your car, electric. I don't quite agree. Yes, we don't want some weird experimental electric car. And just converting a normal ICE car to electric has been a good strategy for some car companies. I have the Kia Soul EV myself, and they managed to sell it here at a very good price, and it's a very nice car. Niro and Kona are also good examples. At the same time, Nissan Leaf has done very well as an electric-only car, and Tesla as well obviously, in their niche. But it's obvious that for the next generation of cars, you're not going to compete unless you make a car electric from the ground up. So we don't want just a normal car with the engines swapped out. We don't want some weird experiment either. Just something that's mostly normal, but uses the advantages of electric drivetrains to do things you can't do with ICE cars: you can have a frunk like Tesla, or you can have almost no bonnet on the car at all like Leaf or VW ID.3, you can get better interior space, you can have one-pedal driving, etc. We probably want something more aerodynamic, to improve range, even if it makes the car look a bit weird or not as masculine as some would like. I think the VW ID range is basically the perfect strategy right now.
- rsync 7y ago
  "But it's obvious that for the next generation of cars, you're not going to compete unless you make a car electric from the ground up." I agree with you that there are deep, architectural improvements (skateboard design, multi-motor AWD, etc.) that come along with a clean-sheet design. Certainly I, as a consumer, want all of those things. I am speaking purely on a surface level - I want a BMW 7 Series (or a Range Rover or an A8 or whatever) that has the technology of an electric car underneath. I don't want some cutesy (or space-agey) i-mobile or e-car. I don't want a distinctive, different interior. I don't want weird space-age lights and colors.

by rsync 7y ago

cnasc 7y ago

> No, it didn't. They had a single, sub-brand model (the i3) that was neither technologically interesting nor performant. The i3 didn’t exist 8 years ago. What BMW did have then, and for some time before, was essentially a test fleet of electric 3-series sedans. They had a graphic applied to the sides so you could tell it was one of them. Those were essentially what you’re asking for, and what the article says was poised to be a sensible strategy. For whatever reason they decided to do the i sub brand instead, and that’s where there strategy makes no sense.

tdiggity 7y ago
People loved these too. The problem was that you couldn’t buy the car after the lease was up, bmw wanted them all back to destroy.
- foepys 7y ago
  Maybe they wanted them back to study the parts? It's a completely new type of vehicle for them so they might have wanted real world data about the components.
  - tdiggity 7y ago
    Yea, that could be. At the time, the Leaf was just released, and The Tesla model S was on the verge of being delivered. To consumers, it felt like BMW wasn’t listening to their customers. We just wanted a normal car that had an electric drivetrain and reasonable range. When the i3 debuted, its styling skewed towards the Leaf/Prius. A lot of people didn’t want a car that stood out like that. I think a not-insignificant part of Tesla’s success was that the Model S looks pretty normal.
- netsharc 7y ago
  I've had the pleasure of driving them through DriveNow (BMW's car sharing program). Fun little cars!
- cnasc 7y ago
  Yep, one of my friends was in the program for that. He was permitted to get a special edition i3 right when they launched in lieu of being able to buy the car off-lease.
jordanbeiber 7y ago
I’m guessing guarding the quarterly vs committing to a very expensive long term strategy. Only makes sense for individual execs and shareholders short term. I remember Tesla being heckled for how difficult it is to build cars. Only Tesla didn’t build grandpa’s cars, they did what BMW should have done - create something new, something that will always be an expensive venture. Also, the diesel cheating probably ties in a bit here? Unsure about BMW specifically, but in general that’s what it looks like to me. Cheap and simple. No one knows about it and it will keep the diesel sales reasonable for quite a while. All about the short term.

netfl0 7y ago

I hear you but I would like something new. The closest concept that tickled my fancy was the Bollinger B1. It was close but it was missing something as simple as airbags. I want a utility vehicle I can spray out with a hose, throw kayaks in, and seat 5 adults. For 30K, please?

skykooler 7y ago
I'm hoping that Rivian will create a more budget vehicle at some point down the line.

mffnbs 7y ago

I agree wholeheartedly with your “we want your car electric” line of thinking. I hate when electric cars try to look like what someone thought an electric car should look like. No one wants that.

benj111 7y ago
On the other hand an IC car has a big heavy engine and compact fuel tank. An EV is the opposite so I think some experimentation is warranted.

entee 7y ago

CFRP was interesting technology. I don’t know enough about how new it was, but building it out as an industrial process at that scale was potentially quite useful. At the time (2013) there was what? The volt, the Model S. That’s pretty much it remotely in the same class of essentially purpose built EV or partial EVs. The Model 3 was 4 years away. Of those the i3 makes a ton of sense. It was a legit good start for a electrification strategy. If BMW has kept investing in this, could they have gotten a model that was basically as good as a model 3? Maybe maybe not, but it would have been interesting to see. Would it have been better than an iPace? Most likely, the weight advantage might have added maybe a few tens of miles at least. The point of the article is that BMW had a good start, did nothing, is now behind. And is now compounding the error by doubling down on doing nothing.

fmajid 7y ago
The model S outsold its German equivalents 2:1. If that wasn’t a wake-up call, I don’t know what is. Are they even capable of engineering anything other than emissions-fraud software any more? The hideous i3 was so unpopular LA dealerships were giving one away for free with each fully-loaded 3 or 4 series purchase (so they would get Corporate off their backs on i3 sales quotas). More generally BMW’s entitled customer-hostile attitude shows with their decision to turn Apple CarPlay into a pay-forever subscription feature. No wonder their sales are I just sold my 2013 335i, and whatever car I get next won’t be a BMW.

audunw 7y ago

> I repeat: We don't want your "electric car", we want your car, electric. I don't quite agree. Yes, we don't want some weird experimental electric car. And just converting a normal ICE car to electric has been a good strategy for some car companies. I have the Kia Soul EV myself, and they managed to sell it here at a very good price, and it's a very nice car. Niro and Kona are also good examples. At the same time, Nissan Leaf has done very well as an electric-only car, and Tesla as well obviously, in their niche. But it's obvious that for the next generation of cars, you're not going to compete unless you make a car electric from the ground up. So we don't want just a normal car with the engines swapped out. We don't want some weird experiment either. Just something that's mostly normal, but uses the advantages of electric drivetrains to do things you can't do with ICE cars: you can have a frunk like Tesla, or you can have almost no bonnet on the car at all like Leaf or VW ID.3, you can get better interior space, you can have one-pedal driving, etc. We probably want something more aerodynamic, to improve range, even if it makes the car look a bit weird or not as masculine as some would like. I think the VW ID range is basically the perfect strategy right now.

rsync 7y ago
"But it's obvious that for the next generation of cars, you're not going to compete unless you make a car electric from the ground up." I agree with you that there are deep, architectural improvements (skateboard design, multi-motor AWD, etc.) that come along with a clean-sheet design. Certainly I, as a consumer, want all of those things. I am speaking purely on a surface level - I want a BMW 7 Series (or a Range Rover or an A8 or whatever) that has the technology of an electric car underneath. I don't want some cutesy (or space-agey) i-mobile or e-car. I don't want a distinctive, different interior. I don't want weird space-age lights and colors.