March 14, 2017—In the first two months of 2017, BMW doubled its combined sales of electric cars and plug-in hybrids over the same period in 2016.
In December, BMW CEO Harald Krueger said the automaker hopes to sell 100,000 electric cars and plug-in hybrids this year—the same amount of plug-in cars in one year as the company sold in the previous three years.
BMW began sales of the i3 electric car in Europe in November 2013, and only crossed the 100,000-unit mark for all of its plug-in cars put together in November of last year. In January and February of this year, BMW delivered over 10,000 electric cars and plug-in hybrids globally. That's an increase of 110.1 percent over the same period last year, according to the automaker.
Going forward, BMW will at least have a broader lineup of models as it tries to increase plug-in car sales, Green Car Reports states. Until recently, the lineup was limited to the "i" models—the i8 plug-in hybrid, and the i3 hatchback, in both all-electric and range-extended REx configurations. In the U.S., BMW now sells plug-in hybrid versions of the 3-Series and 7-Series sedans, and the X5 SUV as well.
The 530e iPerformance plug-in hybrid—a variant of the redesigned 5-Series sedan—will go on sale later this month, followed by the Mini Cooper S E Countryman All4 crossover in June.
