BMW i4 Gran Coupe revealed

After the Shocky Horror Picture Show that was the 2021 BMW iX electric crossover reveal this week, BMW didn’t wait long to show its long-awaited full-line BMW i4 Gran Coupe EV today.

Shown at the Bavarian independent auto-maker’s annual conference in Munich, the 2021 BMW i4 Gran Coupe will arrive in North America and Europe in the middle of this year.

The top-spec car, called the BMW i50xDrive Gran Coupe, will have up to 390kW of power and, in a gentler guise, 590km of zero-emissions range from its 100kWh battery.

While BMW confirmed its German price at €77,300 ($A118,700 as a straight figure, before taxes), it has been built to tackle cars like the Audi e-tron Coupe, Tesla Model 3 and a horde of other premium EVs that aren’t quite ready yet.

The pricing in Germany is similar to the BMW X5, though.

It’s a key part of BMW’s acceleration towards EVs, with the group’s MINI brand already confirming it will join stablemate Rolls-Royce, as well as Jaguar and Volvo, by becoming a pure EV manufacturer by 2030. It will launch its final-ever combustion-powered model in 2025.

The BMW i4 Gran Coupe will shoot BMW from having a one-car EV range to four in a matter of months, including the i3, the iX3, the iX and now the i4 Gran Coupe.

It will follow this up with pure EV variants of the 5 Series, 7 Series and X1 in the chase to make half of BMW’s sales volume EVs by 2025, which would take around two million BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce cars.

BMW is also planning to sell at least 10 million EVs before 2030.

Where others have pushed their EV releases back, BMW has pulled the i4 Gran Coupe’s launch date forward by three months.

"The decision to launch three months early was easy," said BMW CEO Oliver Zipse, insisting BMW was "picking up the pace" with electrifying its line-up.

While full details of the i4 Gran Coupe won’t be released for at least two weeks, it comes hot on the heels of the iX and the iX3, which was the first full-line EV BMW had launched since the i3 hatchback in 2013.

The acceleration in electrification, then, is well overdue.

BMW plans to have 12 EVs, covering 90 per cent of its market segments, on sale by the end of 2023.

They will reach that figure by offering EV options in existing bodyshells, via the CLAR modular architecture that can house combustion, hybrid, plug-in hybrid or EV powertrains.

With a battery made from lithium sourced in Australia and Morocco, the 2021 BMW i4 Gran Coupe will use an electric motor from the iX3 SUV at each end.

The sleek four-door liftback will share its underpinnings with the iX crossover and though BMW has been shy on details, there are clues to its performance in the specifications of its uglier brother.

BMW has confirmed that at least one version of the i4 Gran Coupe will run to 100km/h in 4.0 seconds on its way to a limited top speed of 200km.

It will also recharge at fast chargers of up to 200kW, filling its 100kWh lithium-ion battery in record time.

“With its sporty looks, best-in-class driving dynamics and zero local emissions, the BMW i4 is a true BMW,” said BMW's board member for Customer, Brand and Sales, Pieter Nota.

“It makes the heart of the BMW brand now beat fully electric.”

Well, apart from all those combustion engines and hybrids, obviously.

While the “40” and “50” versions of the i4 are so far said to share the 100kWh battery pack, there will eventually be a cheaper rear-drive “30” with the iX3’s smaller 80kWh battery (in the more EV-loving parts of the world) in around a year.

Given the shared platforms, economies of scale suggest it will share the innards of its big brother, so expect the i4 Gran Coupe to have the electric motor, power electronics and the single-speed gearbox squeezed inside a single housing.

The i4 Gran Coupe will be capable of charging at up to 200kW, topping up a 10 per cent charge to 80 per cent in less than 40 minutes. It should also be good for 120km range in 10 minutes.

All three early i4 Gran Coupes will share the 100kWh lithium-ion battery of the iX, and the sedan should deliver greater range purely because of its lower weight.

If it follows exactly to its big brother, the i4 Gran Coupe will be offered in 240kW and 370kW guise, and probably somewhere in between.

Having claimed a 4.0sec sprint to 100km/h for the flagship version, it’s likely that BMW will take it down the iX’s path and give it a model that crosses the barrier in five seconds and another in six seconds.

The i4 is based on a modified version of the CLAR platform, which underpins the current 3 Series and 4 Series, with some significant changes.

Some of those include spaceframe aluminium modules and a carbon-composite lightweight cell around the cabin, like BMW uses on the 7 Series, to save weight.

The i4 Gran Coupe remains faithful to the original Concept i4 from last year and bears an unmistakable similarity to the combustion-powered 3 Series and 4 Series BMWs.

This time around, though, the next 4 Series Gran Coupe with combustion power will follow the i4 Gran Coupe, making the body style available with EV, PHEV and combustion options.

It will massively shift its EV development strategy from 2025 with the “Neue Klasse” process to deliver a more concentrated focus on software and technology, and part of that technology will be more efficient battery cells and greater cell recycling.