Yahoo Autos The BMW iNext Is What’s Next from the Brand’s EV Division
BMW is set to show a near-production version of its forthcoming iNext later this year ahead of its arrival in 2021, but we’ve already been harvesting details about what we can expect from the radical new electric model.
Based on the preliminary sketches and the inexorable logic of the market, we can expect it to be a crossover, and we know that it will be one of the first cars to be built on BMW’s new modular Fifth Generation architecture. So, unlike the current i3, it will use a metal structure rather than a carbon-fiber monocoque, and it will also be produced in significantly higher volumes. BMW says it will be assembled on the same production line as the traditional models built at its plant in Dingolfing, Germany.
We saw a prototype version of the iNext’s battery pack during a recent visit to BMW’s electric powertrain development workshop in Munich. While company engineers were markedly reticent to discuss its finer details, we can report that it is made up of rectangular cells and will be cooled by channelling coolant through a bottom plate, as on the BMW i3. We don’t have official word on capacity, but we can safely expect the iNext’s halo status will require it to carry more juice than the 70.0-kW/h battery pack of the forthcoming iX3; the engineers hinted at more than 100.0 kW/h. BMW has just announced a multibillion-dollar deal with Chinese battery maker CATL, which will presumably be supplying the cells for the iNext and the 11 other EVs (alongside 13 plug-in hybrids) that the company plans to have on sale by 2025.
The iNext’s other role is to act as a showcase for BMW’s aggressive move into high-level autonomy. At the company’s annual general meeting earlier this year, chairman Harald Kruger promised that it will be launched with what he described as Level 3.5 of the five levels of autonomy-with Level 3 normally being described as “eyes off”-and will quickly move onto Level 4, allowing the car to pilot itself without human help in certain areas.
We’ll find out more later this year with a near-production “Vision” concept.
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