BMW is under pressure from its own unions to reverse its long-held policy against stand-alone … [+]
BMW has long swum against the mainstream by arguing that hybrid car platforms would win a green future, but that was before its Works Council started pushing dedicated electric-car platforms.
It could and should lead to a wholesale change in engineering for BMW, which had advocated for each of its new platforms to switch between combustion engines, plug-in hybrid powertrains and full electric power.
The approval of the Works Council – which has BMW advisory board seats as representatives of the firm’s workers – should lead BMW in an entirely new direction on electric cars.
“Only with our own e-architecture can we fully exploit the advantages of an electric vehicle,” Works Council chief
Though EVs would lead to fewer assembly jobs, the Chairman of the Works Council and Deputy Chairman … [+]
Manfred Schoch told Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine, insisting BMW should make the switch.
The irony is that BMW admitted to betting the farm on its hybrid platforms for three reasons: cost, flexibility and to protect union jobs in Germany, because EV assembly requires far fewer hands than it currently takes to build a BMW.
BMW has long championed the hybrid platform strategy for its ability to quickly shift its production mix in the face of changing customer demands, or as its retiring Director of Development insisted, no EV demand at all.
BMW engineers have advocated, in private, the need for at least one, probably two dedicated EV architectures from the Bavarian powerhouse, though BMW’s board took them down the hybrid platform path.
That path will see its first fruits in the electric version of the BMW X3 and the upcoming i4, with its massive grille.
But the Works Council leader admitted fears that the hybrid strategy could see the company overtaken by competitors from as far afield as China.
Stuttgart-based arch-rival, Mercedes-Benz, has also decided on hybrid EV architectures, as seen on the EQC EV, which is based on the GLC SUV.
Volkswagen never believed in the hybrid platform and at last count the Volkswagen Group had four … [+]
The German powerhouse Volkswagen Group, meanwhile, has multiple dedicated EV platforms spread throughout its brands. It has its MEB (Modular Electric Matrix) platform for mass production use, starting with this year’s ID.3 and scaling up in size to large SUVs.
It also has the C-Bev architecture, which sits beneath the e-tron, the J1 platform for the Taycan and the upcoming Audi e-tron GT and the upcoming PPE architecture for future premium and high-performance cars from Audi, Porsche, Bentley and even Lamborghini.
It has also offered the MEB platform for wider use, insisting that scale is the only way to make EVs profitable, and it has been picked up by Ford, as well as a smaller ride-share company in Germany. It’s unlikely that MEB would be on BMW’s radar as an option, though it could give them a short cut in development and costs.
The advantages of a pure EV platform include lower weight, greater interior space and longer range from the same battery pack.
