Traditional car companies counterattack "another shot" range of 590km of pure electric BMW i4 consider it?

To say that traditional car companies most "hate" who, it is Tesla. This newborn enterprise by the pure electric car wind, in less than 10 years time jumped to the world's highest market value of the automobile company, let those hundred years old factory can only look back. Although the boat is too big to turn, but in recent years the traditional luxury brands are not willing to lag behind, began to make efforts in the field of pure electric vehicles, a fist product are "muzzle" on the Tesla. i4 as BMW following the iX after the Tesla fired "another shot", and its 590km WLTP. Its 590km WLTP range and less than 4-second "break 100" time are both very good, but can this be its lethal weapon?

The i4 Concept is still a lot flashier

From the outside, the i4's production version looks a lot more restrained than the Concept, and minus some blue accents on the bodywork and four low-wind resistance wheels, it's a BMW 4-Series - or a Gran Coupe, as we've never seen it before.

The huge "double-kidney" grille, the signature design language of the new generation of BMWs, has polarized opinion. But no matter what, the recognizability is really high. As you can see, on the i4, the upper part of the "double kidney" has been closed off to reduce wind resistance, while the lower part of the opening is designed to dissipate heat from the battery pack, which is equipped with a liquid-cooling system.

While the new i4 is very much a 4-series car, it's still a very attractive coupe. A large number of parts common to the 4-series, such as sheet metal cladding, lights, exterior mirrors, and so on, also help the i4 reduce production costs, making it easy for it to get into a price war with Tesla.

Previous spy shots of the i4's production interior show a larger center screen than the 4 Series

The March 17 launch event didn't reveal the i4's interior, and officials said it would be officially unveiled in the following weeks. However, the previous spy photos show that the i4's interior will probably follow the layout of the current 4-series, still utilizing common parts to reduce costs, which also indicates that the i4 should take the cost-effective route. Of course, I am also looking forward to the real car interior debut will give people a bigger surprise.

Instrumentation interface of the eighth-generation iDrive system

According to BMW's official news, the i4 will be equipped with BMW's latest eighth-generation iDrive system, which will support the 5G network and seamlessly integrate with the cloud services, allowing functions that require a large amount of computational power to be transferred to the BMW cloud, and processing a large amount of data and complex tasks through the BMW Cloud Computing Center. Meanwhile, the intelligent personal assistant built into the eighth-generation iDrive system is also powered by the latest AI, which can intelligently push functions and provide suggestions for users instead of passively accepting instructions, which will greatly facilitate users' car life.

In terms of the most anticipated powertrain, the i4 has only announced information on the top-spec version of the model. The model will be equipped with an 80kWh battery pack and dual electric motors, with a combined maximum power of 390kW, a 0-100km/h acceleration time of around 4 seconds, and a range of 590km under WLTP conditions, and it's reported that BMW will also launch a lower-specification entry version of the i4 in the future, as well as a more powerful M Power model that focuses on performance.

Looking ahead:

The i4, with its coupe-like styling and expected lower pricing, is supposed to be a bigger seller than the iX. Not only does it offer great range and power, but as a new platform, it's also smarter than any BMW model has ever been. Compared with its biggest rival, the Tesla Model 3, I believe the i4's more luxurious interior, more mature ergonomic design and more sophisticated driving control tuning are the keys to victory.

BMW Chairman Zipzer

At the BMW Group's annual earnings conference held on the day of the i4's release, BMW Chairman Zipzer unveiled BMW's future plans for the implementation of all-electric vehicles: by 2023, BMW will offer at least one all-electric model in about 90 percent of its market segments; by 2025, BMW's sales of all-electric models will grow by more than 50 percent year-over-year; and by 2030, sales of all-electric models will grow by more than 50 percent year-over-year. By 2025, BMW's pure electric model sales will grow by more than 50 percent year-on-year; by 2030, pure electric models will account for at least 50 percent of total global sales, which is enough to see BMW's far-reaching layout and high-speed response in pure electric.

In the BMW Group's "three-step" transformation, the i4 (including the iX) is still in the first stage, equipped with BMW's latest electric drive system technology and intelligent in-vehicle software. In the next phase, BMW will be committed to building smart vehicle architectures. This architecture will help BMW to launch products equipped with different drive technologies in the same model - whether it is a traditional fuel engine or pure electric drive - can be applied to the same model. In this way, BMW will be able to quickly adapt to different regional markets and bring new cars to Bimmers everywhere.