BMW did not look into contact five years ago. While rivals ran to explain the death of the combustion engine and promised all electrical futures, Munich refused. It sounded shy, even old -fashioned. But today this hesitation looks more likely to look like – because BMW may be the only premium car manufacturer who actually reads the market properly.
BMW’s bet on every drive train could be the smartest step in the industry
Car manufacturers love certainty. It ensures brave headlines, self -confident road maps and the type of PR statements that have been repeated for years. In the past half decades, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and GM all explained that the future was battery-electrical and nothing else. The internal combustion was over, hybrids were irrelevant and hydrogen was a distraction.
BMW never played along. Instead of explaining the death of the combustion or promising a purely electrical line -up, it doubled to the complexity that is not German. Petrol and diesel would stay in the portfolio. Plug-in hybrids would remain. EVS would be available in several flavors and architectures. Hydrogen would live on. Range extensions were not excluded. Critics said BMW had no instruction. And we were some of these critics. In reality, Munich prepared for the one important certainty: uncertainty.
The architecture of flexibility
BMW’s strategy is not just about preserving several drive trains, but about building the platforms to support them. This is an approach that we have seen since the beginning of the BMW I sub-fire.
At one end you have Clar, the platform with rear wheel drive base, which underpins the 3-series, 5-series, 7 series and your SUV counterparts. Clar is flexible enough to support combustion, plug-in hybrid and battery-electric applications. And even hydrogen. It is the backbone of the current line -up of BMW, and it doesn’t go anywhere. Even if new class arrives, Clar will develop and technology will merge from Toyota partnerships for hydrogen and knowledge from EV development. It is crucial that it also serves as the basis for the hydrogen project of BMW from 2028 and offers the company a further drive train without reinventing the wheel.
Then there is FAAR, the architecture with front-wheel drive, which contains smaller models such as the X1, 1 series and 2 Series. Here, too, BMW keeps all options on the table: efficient petrol and diesel engines, hybrids and even electric vehicles, such as the Mini-Landsmann SE.
In the future, the new class (NCAR) represents the special EV future of BMW. The start in 2025 is built from the ground up to electrification, whereby the sixth generation batteries are used with 30% more range, 30% faster and significant efficiency gains. In new class, the clean EVS of the Life-Slim limousines and crossovers will be defined by the next decade of the BMW design and technology.
However, new class is more than EVS
However, new class is not limited to battery -electric drive lines. BMW allegedly examines Range Extenders based on NCAR, especially for China, where the formula is surprisingly successful. In fact, BMW is not a stranger to the concept. The BMW i3 with Range Extender (Rex) was a clever solution for a world that is not yet ready to rely exclusively on charging networks. As editor -in -chief of BMWblog, I personally owned four i3s with Rex. It was a product that simply made sense at that time – the Pure Electric i3 did not have the reach for long trips, and the Rex gave it flexibility that customers appreciated. If you look at today’s market in China, it is easy to see why BMW is dusting this idea and applying to the new class.
Together, these platforms form an interlocking strategy: Clar and Faar for flexibility through combustion and hybrids, new class for pure electric vehicles and possibly rich and hydrogen systems that are overlaid. It’s a complicated puzzle – and that’s the point.
From skepticism to justification
I will be honest: A few years ago even we were skeptical at BMWblog. How many did we think that the EV narrative in the industry was useful. Electric cars felt inevitable and BMW’s refusal to refuse to refuse, carefully and even shyly looked.
But the leadership of BMW clearly had a different vision – one that extensively the electrification with realism. And today this vision paid off. Enter a garage of a BMW customer and you see a mixture of ice cream and EVS as a uniform solution. Families run an X5 plug-in hybrid alongside an i4. Enthusiasts stick to an M3 while adding an IX customer (I was one of them), choose the technology that fits your lifestyle and not what the industry told you should want.
BMW expected this reality better than most others.
Why is security important
While BMW built flexibility, its competitors built walls. Volkswagen entered into the ID family All-in to bring back production because the demand left. At the early 2030s, Mercedes-Benz promised to become all-electric, and then quietly admitted that hybrids and combustion “as long as customers want”. GM left hybrids to pursue Tesla and then introduced them again.
The auto industry wanted a single solution. Customers wanted decisions.
Another piece of this puzzle is regulation. Over a decade ago, the governments in Europe, the USA and Asia aggressive EV goals announced. But deadlines continue to change, incentives come and go and political winds change quickly.
BMW’s multi-path strategy isolates a little more from these swings. If the supervisory authorities push for hardeners, new class can bear the load. When markets pull their feet, Clar and Faar can flow the combustion and hybrids. When hydrogen subsidies – such as in Japan, Korea and parts of Europe – are improved to BMW. This flexibility is less glamorous than a brave heading, but in practice much more resilient.
Protection of the soul of the brand
This approach also protects the DNA of BMW. For enthusiasts, this means that M-cars with inline six and V8 will not disappear overnight. We will see a first M3 Electric, but a petrol version also follows. For Rolls-Royce, this means that the electrical ghost and the future EVS can exist next to the timeless V12. BMW does not force the legacy aside, but offers a choice. And that’s something you have to welcome in this phase.
The balance is important. Mercedes-AMG without V8 Thunder is a hard sale. Volkswagen GTI without petrol feels like an identity crisis. In contrast, BMW does not have to apologize to Puristen while still driving with EVS, hydrogen and hybrids.
By 2028, BMW incineration cars on Clar and FAAR, clean EVS on new class, hydrogen fuel cells will have proven architecture and range extensions for markets that they demand. It is a portfolio that does not match any other premium car manufacturer.
