As the automobile industry undergoes its biggest shift ever, collaborations among the auto majors are becoming the norm. Two such iconic OEMs, Jaguar Land Rover and BMW, have now announced a partnership to develop electric car technologies as they look forward to an electric, connected and autonomous future for mobility.
The two partnering firms are no strangers to electric vehicles. BMW had come up with its all-electric i3 back in 2013, way earlier than many other makers. Jaguar Land Rover also took the automotive industry by storm last year with the launch of its electric SUV, the Jaguar I-Pace, a vehicle that even managed to overthrow the dominant Tesla Model X in the segment in many of its markets.
Now the companies will be developing electric drive units for their future electric vehicles. To start with this, a team of engineers from both the firms will first be designing the said drive units in a facility in Munich, Germany. Following this, the units will be manufactured by both BMW and JLR in their respective manufacturing plants.
Jaguar i-PACE (Image: Jaguar)
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Why the collaboration?
The transition to electric vehicles raises many challenges for OEMs, including the technological know-how and ways to achieve the same within a cost-effective model. More importantly, as these electric vehicles advance over the years, requiring more range and less charging times, such companies will have to adapt to the advancements rapidly to stay in competition.
This is where the partnership will help. As for BMW and JLR, the auto majors mention that the collaboration is aimed at the research and development of electric drive units through shared resources. This would result in lesser expense at the R&D for each of the firms and a faster turnaround time for new technologies.
A shared plan to go about the implementation of these electric drive units in the vehicles will also prove helpful. The giants will be sharing production planning as well as plans to procure the electric car parts for their vehicles. The manufacturing, however, will be carried out individually by both the firms in their respective plants.
BMW Group electrified cars (Image: BMW)
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The way forward for OEMs?
Collaborations among auto majors has been on a substantial rise since the advent of electric vehicles. Prior to this, a constant cut-throat competition had been raging among the industry players since forever. Now that every maker realises the oncoming of a drastic change in the world of automobiles, it is interesting to note that they find their solutions in such partnerships.
Toyota, for instance, has recently announced its collaboration with Subaru for coming up with an electric SUV. The firms will employ Subaru's all-wheel-drive technologies and Toyota's vehicle electrification technologies to the new SUV. The resulting vehicle will then be sold by each of them under their respective brands.
Suzuki and Toyota recently joined hands for coming up with new hybrid vehicles in India. Under the partnership, Toyota will be responsible for providing its hybrid vehicle technology to Suzuki, along with locally produced batteries. Suzuki will in turn provide two of its vehicle models - Ciaz and Ertiga to Toyota in India in addition to its newly developed engines for compact vehicles.
In the two-wheeler segment, Bajaj and KTM, which have since long been partners, have also announced their renewed efforts towards coming up with electric two-wheelers in India. The expected range of such EVs includes scooters, mopeds as well as small mopeds from the companies.