The BMW Group inaugurated the first of its new retail stores in France recently. Termed as “BMW Brand Store,” the designer store is located at Avenue George V – one of the most luxurious areas of metropolitan Paris and is a part of a comprehensive program at BMW which the company refers to as “Future Retail.”
The main objective behind this initiative is to reach out to the maximum number of customers in an environment where they spend most of their time while shopping. This in turn saves time of the potential customer where he does not needs to drive specifically to a BMW showroom.
Now you can say that BMW is to cars what Apple is to technology. In the latest release of the BrandZ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands study, BMW bagged the number one position for the automotive brands of the world.
The Bavarian giant dethrones Toyota from the number one spot which it won in last year’s survey.
click through for the top 10 list of automotive brands
BMW has been one of the most enviable manufacturer in the recent years. The Bavarian auto maker has strongly held the leadership position not only in India but also the world for a very long time.
Many competing manufacturers such as Mercedes and Audi are trying to dethrone BMW since ages but have faltered in their efforts.
Well, the competitors will certainly not like this piece of information. The Bavarian automaker has publicly announced that it plans to achieve its target of selling 2 million cars a mind boggling 4 years before scheduled. The original plan was to sell 2 million cars by the end of 2020. However, the company sold 1.67 million vehicles worldwide last year that too without letting the profits suffer.
The BMW 3 series is an accomplished car in its segment in India. However, pretty soon the F30 (the successor model) will replace the E90 (the older generation) in India. But something interesting caught our eye from the international automotive scene.
Here is a spyshot of the long wheelbase (LWB) version of the new F30 prepping up for its China debut. LWB version are essentially longer version of the cars with more back seat legroom. They are especially for people who like to be chauffeur driven around. They are big business in China and most manufacturers have a LWB version of their luxury cars.
The F30 seen over here is a 335Li and as one can see that it has a slightly longer rear door and expanded rear cabin to give that extra leg room over the regular 3 Series sedan. It is powered by a 3.0-liter twin-turbo straight-six with 306 horsepower and 400 Nm of torque. It will feature other goodies also such as 8.8-inch control display, an auto start-stop system and a blind-spot awareness system. The LWB 335Li will debut at the Beijing Auto Show in April and will not be available in the United States or Europe.
However, back home, we only have an LWB version of the 7 series. The BMW 3 Series is increasingly being chauffeur-driven in India. In such a scenario, doesn’t the LWB version of the F30 makes absolute sense over here?
BMW is betting big of green cars to drive the growth in the future. Recently, they partnered with Toyota to get access to their hybrid technology. Dust hasn’t settled yet and BMW is already in talks with General Motors to get access to their fuel cell technologies.
German weekly business magazine Wirtschaftswoche reported that the two companies plan to join forces over the development of fuel cell technology.
The talks between the two companies are in highly advanced stage according to the media report and the plan would give BMW future access to GM’s fuel cell technology and in exchange, BMW would contribute to the research costs.
Previously, BMW has developed fuel-cell version of both the 1-Series and 7-Series. However, with a dedicated ‘i’ brand in place just for green vehicles, the company is on a rampage to test new fuel saving technologies that could power the future.
With spiraling research and development cost, most companies are forced to have a joint venture that could help them ease the burden. And at the end of the day, the customer gets a value proposition that he/she could afford and enjoy.
Inset – BMW X6M from Auto Expo 2010 has no relation to the story.
Entry posted on August 11, 2011 by
Shrawan Raja;
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For those who don’t know, we must inform that BMW started its operations producing aircraft engines.
The company’s history spans for more than 90 years and for this period, mystery surrounding the logo of the company has deepened. As BMW started with aircraft engine’s it was easy to guess that the logo resembles an engine propeller in motion but the truth is something else and is explained in the video.
The truth, as explained, is rather very simple. The blue and white colors on the logo are inspired by the colors on the Bavaria’s flag, BMW’s birthplace.
Struggling to match up with the existing competition, Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche has called for war on the rivals BMW and Audi. In the recent years, Mercedes Benz has been constantly outsmarted by the fellow German rivals globally in terms of sales as well as product innovation.
If it’s product innovation, BMW certainly takes the cake. The company from Bavaria has managed to create a new segments and innovative products for itself. If it’s marketing and product design, Audi is more successful in these aspects. Where does that leave Mercedes?
Zetsche takes no shame in admitting that the rivals have zoomed passed Mercedes and something needs to be done – hard and fast. He wrote a letter to all Daimler employees motivating them to pull up their socks.
He writes: “Some of our competitors are now growing faster and more profitably than we are. Granted, those are just snapshots in time and should not be overestimated. After all, many of our best new products are yet to come.”
Do you dream of owing a BMW 7 series or a Rolls Royce Ghost every single day? Of course, you do. Well, then we have some really good news for you. The proposed India-EU FTA (free trade agreement) is actively seeking the removal of import duties on automotive products. If the agreement goes through, we can expect a drastic reduction in prices of imported luxury cars by as much as [ Read More ]
