BMW needs you to know that issues are altering. In fall of 2023, the corporate unveiled the Vision Neue Klasse concept car, an all-electric sedan that previews the design and engineering we are able to anticipate from a brand new era of BMW automobiles. Today, BMW debuts the Vision Neue Klasse X, the crossover member of the brand new EV household. Because whereas BMW insists it’s on the precipice of a paradigm shift, it’s not about to desert its widespread and worthwhile “sports activity vehicles.”
The “Neue Klasse” title is freighted with which means for BMW lovers. The firm first coined this moniker—which is solely German for “new class”—within the early Sixties, making use of it to a brand-new lineup of sporty, modernist sedans. The Neue Klasse spawned the legendary BMW 2002, and saved the corporate from the brink of extinction.
Modern BMW is not existentially threatened the way in which it was within the early Sixties, however the firm faces a dramatically evolving international auto business. BMW has toyed with EVs and hybrids for years now, however the brand new Neue Klasse idea lineup factors to a full-scale re-envisioning of how a BMW appears to be like, works, and drives.
If the Vision Neue Klasse idea sedan is tomorrow’s 3 Series, the Vision Neue Klasse X seen right here might be understood as tomorrow’s X3.
“Together with the BMW Vision Neue Klasse, the BMW Vision Neue Klasse X showcases the breadth of our future BMW model lineup,” stated Oliver Zipse, Chairman of the Board of Management of BMW AG, in a press release. “In this way, we are underlining that the Neue Klasse is much more than just a car or a specific concept; it is redefining the BMW brand—and, at the same time, will be more BMW than ever.”
That means this high-riding crossover must carry out. BMW is bringing a brand new, EV-specific software program technique to the duty. In the standard internal-combustion car, every system—engine, transmission, stability administration, adaptive suspension—is managed by its personal ECU. Tweaking the car’s efficiency in real-time entails numerous communication between these discrete computer systems.
BMW says the Neue Klasse platform will do away with standard system-specific ECUs in favor of “super-brains”—”high-performance computers working smartly together on what, up until now, was processed separately,” stated Frank Weber, member of the Board of Management of BMW AG, in a press assertion. Each super-brain could have as much as 10 occasions the computing energy of a traditional ECU.
This will permit one super-brain to manage all aspects of driving dynamics, from torque supply to traction administration to suspension conduct or drive-mode changes. Another super-brain will deal with all points of automated driving, from the sensor suite to GPS route navigation to steering and braking. BMW guarantees that this super-brain setup will enhance processing energy and pace, whereas simplifying the digital structure of the car and lowering the scale (and weight) of required {hardware}.
“The result will be more dynamic performance, more precision, more efficiency and even more fun to drive,” Weber stated in his assertion.
BMW says the Neue Klasse EVs will use an all-new sixth-generation model of the corporate’s eDrive propulsion expertise. New, spherical lithium-ion batteries promise 20 p.c extra vitality density than the present prismatic cells, and BMW says the Neue Klasse automobiles will use 800-volt structure for fast charging, enabling 186 miles of battery vary with a 10-minute plug-in. Power and efficiency figures weren’t given for the Vision Neue Klasse X.
The most putting side of the Vision Neue Klasse X is its design. Like the Vision Neue Klasse idea sedan, the X’s physique contours are refreshingly easy. The kidney grille, which was squashed and widened on the Neue Klasse sedan, stands tall right here, a signature that BMW says will distinguish its Sport Activity Vehicle fashions from its standard sedans within the all-electric future.
The silhouette is acquainted as a BMW crossover, however the greenhouse is impressively ethereal, partially due to some difficult proportioning: The A- and B-pillars are tapered on their exterior edges, skinny and spindly from the surface however flaring out to standard thickness. Of course, the Vision Neue Klasse X has a Hofmeister kink—a Neue Klasse design signature—although right here it’s represented by a ghostly reflective appliqué on the rear quarter home windows.
Inside, the Vision Neue Klasse X embraces newfound minimalism, regardless of promising an entire new degree of perpetually-connected telecom integration. Rest in peace, iDrive: With the Neue Klasse, BMW needs you to manage the center-dash show by contact or by way of controls on the steering wheel.
A second full-width show on the base of the windshield exhibits pace, battery standing, and different data you’d usually discover on a driver’s instrument panel, which BMW says shall be augmented by a head-up show. Aside from a tiny assortment of bodily buttons on the middle console, the whole cockpit is basically button-free.
As with final 12 months’s Neue Klasse idea sedan, the X options “Verdana” textile upholstery, which is claimed to be plant-and-mineral-based and fully petroleum free. The injection-molded inside elements are stated to be constituted of recycled maritime plastics. The coral shade of the corduroy-like upholstery, coupled with the large panorama roof and the beneficiant greenhouse, give the inside of the X an invitingly ethereal really feel.
In particular person, the Vision Neue Klasse X looks like a midway step between a flight-of-fancy idea automobile and a ready-for-production machine. The headlights and taillights really feel like show-car stuff, and a BMW consultant admitted that the manufacturing inside might want to have a couple of extra bodily controls than what’s on show right here. But the door handles and latches, the physique stampings, and the daylight openings all appear factory-ready—which they higher be, since BMW is promising that the primary Neue Klasse crossover will go into manufacturing in 2025.
Whether you consider this as a wholly new class of automobiles or not, one factor is for certain: The all-electric way forward for BMW shall be outlined by SUVs that, I’m betting, will look so much like what you see right here.