The Germans do make incredible cars that are well rounded and very much liked and accepted, but somehow that hasn’t translated well to the electric vehicles they produced especially when BMW is regarded. What supports this is the fact that BMW sold only about 25,000 of the i3 hatchbacks in 2015 and they are now trying to update and upgrade this model for next year.
Welt am Sonntag, a German weekly, made a report on Sunday that the BMW will give a makeover to the i3 that will reflect on both front and rear ends of the car. But this won’t be enough to save the i3 and the company know it, and just because of that they decided to work on the battery as well trying to extend the range of the i3 from current 114 miles on a full charge (180 miles with “Range Extender”). The thing that German weekly didn’t report, or they just did not have the info about, is the new mileage that the upgraded battery will offer. They just stated that the range increase will be under 50% and will be kept bellow 200 miles.
Just to compare, Tesla Motors’ Model S with its new P100D battery offers over 300 miles on a single charge, but there is something called substantial cost difference. And just how big is the difference can be seen here – 2017 BMW i3 with “Range Extender” costs $47,450 and that is without destination and handling charges, whilst the RWD Model S with 60 kWh battery and range of up to 210 miles without any additional costs goes up to $68,000, and that is with $1,200 for destination and documentation fee.
Welt am Sonntag made an interview with Klaus Fröhlich from BMW’s development division about the plans for autonomous vehicles. Mr. Klaus stated that the BMW wants to have a common standard across the industry when self-driving cars are regarded. Every car should be coming with the same amount of sensors and same systems, and that is the main reason they want to adopt standards across the industry. About five months ago, German car maker announced a self-driving collaboration with Intel and Mobileye. The Mobileye, if you recall, is the Israeli company that worked with Tesla Motors on their Autopilot mode before they parted ways. The allegedly split up came because as they stated, Tesla was “pushing the envelope in terms of safety.” Of course that Tesla disproved those allegations saying that the “break up” was made because Tesla developed its own video-processing system and solved some commercial issues.
