BMW
China Is Poised To Take The Lead In EV Race
Mr Ian Robertson, Board Member of BMW (Sales & Marketing), believes China could steal a march over other countries in electric cars.
“The Chinese Government is putting enormous money into R&D and academic institutions. Clearly, this could be a technological leapfrog they could benefit from. When the time comes, and it could be a relatively short period, Chinese regulations will advance this (electric car) agenda quicker than what could be perceived at the moment,” he told Business Line during the unveiling of the BMW i3 and i8 electric car concepts in Frankfurt recently.
“I think the issue of infrastructure is a bit of a red-herring. The ability to turn a power source into a delivery for electricity is not that difficult. It is a function of demand and there are plenty of companies which will rapidly respond to this need,” he said.In contrast, India is way behind even though a handful of manufacturers have been talking of electric vehicle options. Infrastructure, in terms of charging points, is often cited as the biggest limiting factor but Mr Robertson did not agree with this view.
Mr Robertson also referred to the experience of the BMW Mini E (the demonstration electric car and part of project ‘i’) where the 700-plus customers initially interviewed said they
wanted charging points at convenient locations such as supermarkets and gyms.
Even though a number of municipal charging points were provided, these were hardly used as people preferred their own cables at home for reasons of hygiene.
According to Mr Robertson, the next decade could see ‘greater volatility’ in the car industry than what has been experienced over the last 100 years in terms of more change in processes, technology and the way the industry behaves.
The global economic situation is also more challenging than what it has been to be able to predict what will happen. “The agenda for a car company, therefore, needs to be based on flexible response to the way customers behave, to what is happening on the global economic situation and to what governments are going to do,” he said.
2013 BMW: Vision EfficientDynamics is a go
As proof that car companies no longer make showcars just for giggles, a senior BMW authority out of Munich has assured Inside Line that the Vision EfficientDynamics plug-in pure hybrid 2+2 concept car rolled out in September at the 2009 Frankfurt Auto Show is earmarked for production.
[Source & Read More: Inside Line]
Bosch JV to supply battery for BMW’s Megacity e-car
A joint venture between Bosch and Samsung SDI will supply Li-Ion battery cells for BMW’s Megacity project, an EV due in the first half of the next decade. BMW last week announced it would pull out of the F1 circuit at the end of this season, after management decided to focus its efforts on sustainability issues and reducing carbon emissions.
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