Victory for EVs! FBT exemption prompts BMW to axe petrol-powered Gran Coupe and focus on big-selling i4
The success of BMW’s electric vehicle strategy in Australia has prompted the German luxury brand to axe its petrol-powered 4 Series Gran Coupe line-up.
BMW will now focus its ‘four door coupe’ retailing efforts on the electric i4, which shares its exterior design with the 4 Series Gran Coupe.
The decision to end local sale of the 4 Series Gran Coupe after 10 years and two generations can be directly linked to the success of the Fringe Benefits Tax-exempted i4 eDrive35 EV.
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So far in 2024 BMW has sold 1591 i4s, comprising 1402 eDrive35s, 189 eDrive40s and 143 M50s, both of which are too expensive to be eligible the exemption.
In its last full year on-sale in 2023, BMW sold 805 Gran Coupes.
The i4 eDrive35 alone accounts for six per cent of BMW’s entire 2024 sales volume to the end of October. It is also the most popular single EV model it offers.
Overall, 25 per cent of BMW’s 2024 sales are accounted for by its six FBT-exempt EVs, the i4eDrive35, iX1edrive20, iX eDrive30, iX2 eDrive20 and iX3.
Total BMW EV sales now adds up to a record 29 per cent of overall sales.
The boost in BMW’s local EV sales because of its FBT line-up has been obvious. Its EV share stood at 11.4 per cent at the end of 2023.
The Fringe Benefits tax emption is an Albanese Labor government initiative that applies to electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles priced under the luxury car tax threshold and purchased on a novated lease.
The exemption supplies financial benefits to both the business and employee purchasing the vehicle.
BMW offered three 4 Series Grand Coupes, the entry-level 420i that was axed last Christmas and the 430i and flagship six-cylinder M440i that ended their Aussie production ended mid-year.
The petrol-powered two-door 4 Series Coupe and Cabrio continue on.
“4 Series is the i4 essentially, the i4 Gran Coupe,” confirmed BMW Australia product and market planning chief Brendan Michel.
“We have discontinued the ICE versions of the 4 Series Gran Coupe, we are focussing on BEV.
“We rationalised. We had too many 4 Series Gran Coupes. With the BEVs we had six of them.
“We dropped one of them earlier on and then middle of this year we dropped the rest of the ICE.”
There is as yet no indication BMW will cull more ICE powertrains to make way for BEVs in its line-up.
But it has made clear it will add more BEVs. The global vision shared locally is to have by 2030 a 50:50 sales split between electric vehicles and ICE powertrains with either mild hybrid or plug-in hybrid assistance.
“EV is a very important thing in our portfolio,” said Michel. “But in saying that we know ICE is still going to play a big part throughout the second half of this decade and even into the next decade.
“With this new NVES (New Vehicle Emissions Standard) we need to look a little closer at all our long range planning to see where all this lands.
“What’s going to be our mix of BEVs? What’s going to be mild hybrids? What’s going to be plug-in hybrids?
“But we’ll take that as it comes.
