BMW and Jaguar Land Rover Unite to Develop EVs
BMW and Jaguar Land Rover are joining forces to develop electric and hybrid vehicles, the two automakers have announced.
The aim of the collaboration is to ultimately reduce the cost needed to develop what’s known as electric drive units (EDUs), which are incredibly costly and something car manufacturers have long struggled with.
By collaborating, the two automakers hope to jointly develop a platform for EDUs, which should bring costs down for both and make producing electric or plug-in vehicles cheaper.
BMW launched its first electric vehicle, the i3, in 2013, with the i8 plug-in supercar arriving a year later. Other vehicles using BMW’s electrified technology have followed, and next year, the German company plans to release the BMW iX3, an SUV version of the original i3. This will use the propulsion system which, together with Jaguar Land Rover, BMW will develop for use in future electrified vehicles.
JLR, meanwhile, was relatively late to the electric vehicle market, with the i-Pace, the company’s first fully electric vehicle, made available last year. Similarly, the first electrified Range Rover, the Sport P400e, was also released. However, the automaker has committed to having an electrified model of every car it makes by 2020.
