As the manufacturer attempts to use its well-liked three-door hatchback to compete with a variety of smaller Chinese battery-powered vehicles surging into Europe, BMW AG is introducing a fully electric platform for its Mini brand.
The new iteration of the Mini Cooper EV will be on exhibit at the IAA motor show in Munich the following week after being developed by Great Wall Motor Co.
A partner of BMW, who will also manufacture the vehicle in China and export it to Europe.
BMW will stop producing the electric Mini in the UK and move production there.
According to the Mini CEO, Cowley facility, located outside of Oxford. Is not adequate to the task of producing electric vehicles.
BMW Gets Help From China
Britain’s potential to serve as a global hub for the production of zero-emission vehicles will take a huge hit. As a result of BMW’s decision to move all UK production of the award-winning electric Mini to China.
In its Cowley plant outside of Oxford, BMW produces 40,000 electrified Minis annually.
As part of efforts to revamp the automaker’s lineup starting in 2024. It was confirm in a Times article that BMW Oxford will stop producing electric vehicles in 2019.
The decision is a further setback to the UK’s aspirations to lead the world in the production of electric vehicles. Especially in light of Honda’s 2016 decision to leave the country.
Due to a joint venture between BMW and Great Wall Motor, the next generation zero-emission Mini Aceman as well as the hatchback and small SUV models are currently produce in east China.
BMW has confirmed that its Leipzig facility will produce a new, electrified version of the largest Mini model, the Countryman.
The news comes after Mini CEO Stefanie Wurst said.
Last week that a convertible model will be add to the brand-new Mini Cooper lineup, which is schedule to debut in 2024. That it will “come home” in 2025 with production taking place in the UK at the Mini Oxford factory.
For export to countries like the US, Japan, and the Middle East, petrol Mini Coopers will be construct in Oxford in three-door, five-door.
Convertible body styles. BMW has confirmed that it won’t stop making Minis with internal combustion engines until 2030.
Following news that Britishvolt, which is building Britain’s only large-scale battery manufacturing in the north-east of England, will fail without receiving a £200 million rescue package, BMW made its decision.
During the Cop26 climate summit in Glasgow just one year ago, Boris Johnson, the prime minister at the time, pledged to invest £1 billion in an electric car revolution in the UK that would “create hundreds of thousands of jobs.”
Theresa May, his predecessor, named the production of electric vehicles one of the “pillars” of her short-lived industrial policy with the intention of making Britain “a world leader” in this field.
The electrified automobile industry would be “front and center of Britain building itself back up,”. According to Kwasi Kwarteng, who was fire as chancellor on Friday and replace by Jeremy Hunt. He made this statement last year while serving as business secretary.
BMW Gets Help From China
The Oxford plant won’t construct any new electric vehicles until the following decade. According to those pledges and the seven-year model cycles normally used by automakers.
It has been rumore that BMW intends to sell the iconic Cowley factory to Great Wall. Which has been open about the fact that its significant sales drive.
Into the European electric market may eventually prompt it to look for its own manufacturing facilities there.
“Oxford will always be the home of Mini,” countered Wurst.
According to her, the decision to stop producing the electric Mini in the UK was made because. The Cowley plant was operating inefficiently due to having to produce it.
Both electric and gasoline-powered vehicles are on the same line. Because of post-Brexit supply constraints and border friction with the EU or the absence of a nearby gigafactory.
