The BMW Group posted solid year-on-year sales growth of 8.4 percent last year, with a total of 2,521,525 BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce vehicles delivered to customers worldwide. BMW sales reached a new all-time high of 2,213,795 units (+9.1%) last year, with the brand leading the global premium segment. The company more than doubled its sales of fully-electric vehicles in 2021 to 103,855 units (+133.2%).
“Despite supply bottlenecks and the continuing coronavirus pandemic: We achieved a strong sales performance in 2021, thanks to a powerful operational performance and stellar product line-up. Our brands reported numerous all-time best sales results around the globe – spearheaded by the BMW brand, which is number one in the global premium segment,” said Pieter Nota, member of the Board of Management of BMW AG responsible for Customer, Brands, Sales. “With more than 100,000 fully-electric vehicles sold last year, ramping up electromobility was our clear focus,” Nota continued.
The company is optimistic about the current year. “In 2022 we want to continue our profitable growth and we will systematically expand our range of fully-electric vehicles. We have set ourselves particularly ambitious growth targets in this area and aim to more than double our sales of fully-electric vehicles from last year,” Nota added.
With the introduction of the BMW iX and BMW i4, the BMW Group has significantly expanded its digitalisation of the customer interface.
For instance, as well as offering intuitive configuration to simplify the purchasing process, pre-configured new vehicles and newer used cars across the entire model range can already be bought online in the BMW Group’s domestic market of Germany. By 2025, the company plans to sell around a quarter of its vehicles entirely online.
Data-based recognition of service requirements enables proactive customer care. This means the customer can be contacted directly and receive assistance remotely, wherever possible, or a visit to the workshop can be set up easily and efficiently, if needed.
The new My BMW/MINI app offers even more additional features, such as booking of digital services or broad access to charging options, and also provides a direct channel to customers.
2021 dominated by electromobility offensive
In 2021, 13 percent of BMW and MINI vehicles sold worldwide – a total of 328,316 units (+70.4 %) – were already electrified. In Europe it was already more than 23 percent (225,415 units).
With 37,939 BMW iX3 vehicles sold in 2021, about one in ten BMW X3 vehicles delivered to customers worldwide was fully electric. During this same period, one in three customers worldwide who bought a MINI 3 door model opted for the model’s fully-electric variant (34,851 units). At the same time, the BMW i3, the world’s only fully-electric premium vehicle in the compact segment, continued to grow in its ninth year: With 28,216 vehicles sold, 5.4 percent more BMW i3 vehicles were sold than in the previous year.
The BMW Group released two key innovation flagships, the BMW iX and the BMW i4, onto the market late last year. In 2022, the company will further expand its electric line-up with fully-electric versions of the BMW 7 Series and BMW X1 and, in 2023, the high-volume BMW 5 Series. These will be joined by other models, including the successor to the MINI Countryman and the all-electric Rolls-Royce Spectre.
By 2023, the company will have at least one fully-electric model on the roads in about 90 percent of its current market segments. Over the next ten years or so, the company plans to sell a total of about ten million fully-electric vehicles.
The Neue Klasse, which is uncompromisingly geared towards fully-electric drivetrains, will make a significant contribution to BMW Group sales volumes from the middle of the decade onwards.
The MINI brand’s product range will be exclusively all-electric by the early 2030s, while Rolls-Royce will also be an all-electric brand from 2030 onwards. All future new models from BMW Motorrad in the field of urban mobility will be fully electric.
Another milestone in the success story of BMW M GmbH
With a total of 163,542 M vehicles (+13.4%) delivered to customers, BMW M GmbH once again posted all-time record sales in both the high-performance and performance segments. The new BMW M3 and BMW M4 performed especially well. Sales of the BMW X5 M and BMW X6 M Sports Activity Vehicles also increased year-on-year. In the performance segment, growth came mainly from the new 4 Series derivatives – and the 4 Series Coupé, in particular. The X3 M40i and X7 M50i also enjoyed growing popularity. This year, the fully-electric BMW iX M60 and BMW i4 M50 models will further contribute to the future success of the brand.
One in ten MINI customers worldwide already drives fully electric
The MINI brand delivered 302,144 vehicles to customers last year – 3.3 percent more than in 2020. Around 17 percent of these vehicles had an electrified drive train. More than one in ten MINI customers opted for the fully-electric MINI: the MINI Cooper SE (34,851 units). The MINI Electric is the MINI family’s highest-volume model and was a driving force for the brand in 2021, delivering growth of 98.2 percent worldwide. With a planned realignment of the model range, expansion of production capacity and development of new target groups and markets, the MINI strategy will remain focused on successful, profitable growth going forward.
