Manufacturing electric vehicles competitively is hard.
From the FT via Ars Technica, February 10:
17 percent of BMW sales are EVs; another 7 percent are hybrids.
BMW has pledged to continue investing in combustion engine and hybrid technology as it warned of a “rollercoaster ride” in the US transition to electric vehicles following the return of Donald Trump as president.
Board member Jochen Goller said the group remained optimistic about sales of petrol and plug-in hybrids in the US even if demand for EVs slowed over the next few years on the back of policy changes under the new administration.
“I think it would be naive to believe that the move towards electrification is a one-way road. It will be a rollercoaster ride,” Goller, who is in charge of customer, brands, and sales, told the Financial Times at BMW’s headquarters in Munich.
“This is why we are investing in our combustion engines,” he said. “We are investing in modern plug-in hybrids. And we will continue rolling out electric cars.”
BMW, which also owns the Rolls-Royce and Mini brands, has long been cautious about the pace of the global shift to EVs, developing a broad range of products long before growth in EV sales started to slow.
The company last year issued a profit warning after it was hit by sliding sales in China and forced to recall 1.5 million vehicles due to potentially faulty brake systems developed by Continental.
But its broader strategy has mostly paid off at a time when its German rivals Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz have struggled to adjust to slowing demand for EVs despite their earlier ambitions to go all-electric.
While international peers including Toyota and Stellantis have also taken a multi-energy approach, BMW has stood apart for its strong offering of EVs with the same design and appearance as their petrol and hybrid counterparts.
The group’s sales of fully electric cars rose 13.5 percent last year to 426,594 vehicles, accounting for 17 percent of total sales. Including hybrids, the electrified proportion was 24 percent....
....MUCH MORE
