Interview with Frank van Meel – Part 1 (Part II here. Part III here. Part IV here)
According to Adam Shaver (Managing Director, BMW Group New Zealand), 2024 was a difficult year for the automotive industry in New Zealand, which is a bit of an understatement. But he says, what’s really exciting is that in many ways it was actually a very, very successful year for BMW group in New Zealand. “BMW New Zealand managed to claim the number one spot in the premium market in New Zealand vs the group of competitors that we measure ourselves against for the first time in over 10 years”.
So despite the headwinds, Shaver thinks BMW showed a lot of resilience. Saying they have an outstanding product portfolio, (as you know), and at the end of the day, they’re extremely proud to be back to the number one spot. “Also from an M perspective , despite being a small market on a global scale, relatively speaking m plays an outsized role in the NZ market.”
In fact, BMW New Zealand reached the number one spot around the world in terms of M share, pure M vehicles, “And in the broader definition we finished number 2, just beaten by Switzerland – but we’ll get them next year,” says Shaver. New Zealand customers love their high performance cars and even more than that, they love their M vehicles.
And this is where Frank van Meel joins the conversation. “It’s always interesting to do a deep dive into the markets, and actually you’re right. New Zealand actually is number one in high performance and number 2 worldwide. And in the fourth place is Australia.”
First item on the agenda was any more details on the iM3!
“First of all, it’s just M3”, says van Meel. “because M3 is our promise and we never put any I or E or whatever next to M3. That will remain the same in the future as well independent of the drivetrain.”
Expanding, van Meel says that M are doing a lot in regards to high performance electric drivetrains. It’s not just about the 4 electric motors, it’s also about the control, he believes. “As we say, you create a Beast. And then you have to control it, because it makes no sense to put an insane amount of power in the car and not be able to control it.” He says that’s why they haven’t released any specific data on the electric M3’s power. “We tried out a lot of power just to figure out how that’s going to work, or if it’s not going to work. With 4 electric motors, of course you can do anything you want.”
van Meel says that there are a lot of discussions that they’re currently having about what you see in dynamic mode, ‘because if you have a mechanical drivetrain, just take away the stability control or the way you control the car and you just let it go. But with 4 electric motors there is no definite, ‘let it go’. So every mode has to be re-designed.’
However he stresses that what they do want is the properties that every M car has today, that’s the rear wheel driving (feel). “That is a very important issue. But you will see, we will probably come to that during the stage of our development, and we will also communicate what we are doing then.”
As for the timeline for electric M?
van Meel says that they haven’t built any specific date yet, as right now they are in a development phase. “We’re still working on the technology, not so much on the cars themselves, although we have launched some pictures of prototypes. So that might give a hint of where we’re going.”
He says that if you look at the normal development times in the automotive industry, you might figure out that it’s still going to take a little while before that comes to the market. “But we haven’t communicated any specific timelines yet.”
Stay tuned – as next up van Meel talks about ICE vs Electric. Part II here
