BMW is increasingly driving purely electrically.Image: BMW
BMW sold more cars last year than ever before. The Germans are now completely converting their main Munich factory to produce electric cars by 2027.
Julia Jannaschk / watson.de
BMW wants to soon only produce electric cars at its main plant in Munich. The group is investing several hundred million euros in this ambitious project, as the plant is to be converted while operations continue. This investment could be worth it. Because when you look at the sales figures for 2023, the proportion of electric cars in particular is increasing significantly, giving BMW a big plus.
Investment focus on sustainable mobility
Sales of electric models at BMW increased particularly strongly. Their share rose to 15 percent. This is an increase in electric car growth of more than 92 percent compared to the previous year, said the Munich car manufacturer. 330,596 fully electric vehicles were handed over to customers. In the fourth quarter alone there were 113,458. “We continue to see high demand for our fully electric products,” explained BMW board member Jochen Goller.
BMW is now drawing its conclusions from the sharp increase in demand for electric cars.
According to its own information, the group is aiming to sell more than half a million fully electric vehicles by 2024. But that’s just the beginning: “We are investing 650 million euros here and will therefore be producing exclusively fully electric vehicles in our main plant from the end of 2027,” said production director Milan Nedeljkovic in a statement Press release. Engine production is relocated to England and Austria. 1,200 BMW employees have already been retrained or relocated for the project.
The combustion engine era at BMW will soon be history
75 years after the introduction of the BMW 501, the era of vehicles with combustion engines is coming to an end. According to production director Nedeljkovic, BMW launched six new fully electric models in 2023 alone. This is how the group wants to “shape the future,” said the production director.
With this increase in electric car sales in Germany, BMW is in third place behind Volkswagen and Tesla. According to the Center of Automotive Management, Mercedes and Audi follow in fourth and fifth place. However, the car experts point out that the share of electric cars among German brands is below the market average. This increased from 17.7 percent in 2022 to 18.4 percent.
BMW achieves record sales of 2.55 million cars
BMW sold more cars last year than ever before: after a strong final quarter, global sales rose by 6.5 percent to around 2.55 million vehicles, as the group announced last week.
However, there could be a small setback for the e-car industry in 2024: The federal government decided to end funding for electric cars as early as December 18, 2023. A subsidy through the environmental bonus was actually planned until the end of 2025.
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(with material from afp)
The 20 best-selling electric cars in Switzerland in 2023
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The 20 best-selling electric cars in Switzerland in 2023
Rank 20: BMW i4 (658 sales).
source: BMW
The e-mobile in the test
Video: watson
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