BMW may have been around since then but did not make its first car until 1928(9)

and was closed from 1941-1952. So in reality it is not that long.

Around 70 years total of building cars.

BMW has been around since 1916. That makes them only 13 years younger than Ford & 8 years younger than General Motors. I consider that a fairly long time.

I spent almost a year researching the early years of BMW and wrote it here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_BMW

Check it out, you will find it very enlightening. You cannot move ahead unless you understand the past.

It is no wonder that EU car brands while still having issues they are in a far better place than the US brands, if it was not for GM Opel would be in fine shape, same for Volvo with Ford.

Whoever made the decision to put those bigger Volvo badges on the back of cars this past fall should be fired immediately, ruined a nice piece of metal with all that plastic…

BMW has no interest in buying anyone at this time and has reached parts agreements with other brands to offset development costs and reach economies of scale.

I imagine the same could be said for governmental bailouts of the German brands as well.

I believe BMW dismissed any interest in Volvo cars a while back.

(link didn’t work in post above)

but when you have a company like BMW complaining about their profitability…. uhhhh… base model is cheap, i agree… but the prices charged compared to the cost of product on their options are ridiculous. and to make it worse, they come out with their free-service/warranty programs when their products have so many problems.

they need to attack the reliability issue first, and while doing that, find ways to do things more efficiently like the japanese have.

if they want pity from me, they wont get it because their price scheme is just retarded… theyve got to be making so much profit per new car sold than the japanese do, before factoring in labor costs and compensations.

Halting new development is a no-brainer. Closing down dead product lines is a given. Killing off old engines was going to happen anyway. But moving manufacturing plants, introducing new small models, or entire product lines is simply NOT going to happen. How can they when doing this costs money? Nothing would be better than introducing Isetta to the world or for Fiat to bring the 500 over early to drive up sales, but the infrastructure needed takes too long to implement and (again) costs too much.

Paring down existing lines to make them more cost-effective. Cross shopping existing technology and engines between brands. Reducing overall fleet volumes in dead markets. These are measures that will ensure the continuation of a company. BMW isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

I do agree with C4 in saying that BMW will again become a premium brand, exclusive and rare as it once was. When I was a kid, having a BMW made you just… the business! Because you could burn the cash to get the luxury and performance. I could see that being the scenario once again.

Long live the mighty Bimmer!

However, in general, I think BMW’s long term survival may require introduction of a budget brand (equiv to Honda/Toyota/VW vs. Acura/Lexus/Audi) as a balance to their luxury brand. MINI is a niche market and not a budget brand. Perhaps BMW can merge with Renault, Fiat, or Citroen and market the French/Italian brand as their budget auto brand. Or they can build one similar to how the Japanese manufacturers built luxury brands from scratch.