JANUARY USA SALES - BMW GROUP - Bikes, MINI's and Beemers all show gains in January.

• BMW brand sales up 4.0 percent
• MINI brand sales up 26.9 percent
• BMW Motorcycle sales up 11.8 percent

Sales of BMW brand vehicles increased 4.0 percent in January for a total of 18,981 compared to 18,253 vehicles sold in January, 2014.

“Coming after a record December and a record 2014 year-end result, the January numbers are a solid start for the new year and I am confident the trend will accelerate in the months ahead,” said Ludwig Willisch, President and CEO, BMW of North America. “I am especially pleased that MINI is again showing its strength as availability of its new models improves.”

In January, notable vehicles sales included the BMW 3 and 4 series which increased 13.2 percent to 7,348 vehicles, the BMW 7 series increased 10.8 percent to 637 vehicles and the BMW X5 increased 16.7 percent to 3,214 vehicles.

BMW Group Sales

The BMW Group in the U.S. (BMW and MINI combined) reported January sales of 22,209 vehicles, an increase of 6.8 percent from the 20,796 vehicles sold in the same month a year ago.

BMW Pre-Owned Vehicles

In January, sales of BMW used vehicles (including certified pre-owned) increased slightly, by 3.0 percent, to 14,564 vehicles compared to the 14,143 vehicles sold in January, 2014.

MINI Brand Sales

For January, MINI USA reports 3,228 automobiles sold, an increase of 26.9 percent from the 2,543 sold in the same month a year ago.

MINI Pre-Owned Vehicles

In January, MINI used automobiles (including MINI NEXT certified pre-owned) reported sales of 1,824 automobiles, a decrease of 3.0 percent from the 1,881 sold in January, 2014.

Table 1: Vehicle Sales BMW of North America, LLC, January 2015

	Jan. 2015	Jan.  2014	%	YTD Jan. 2015	YTD Jan.  2014	%
BMW brand	18,981	18,253	4.0	18,981	18,253	4.0
BMW passenger cars	13,597	12,418	9.5	13,597	12,418	9.5
BMW light trucks	5,384	5,835	-7.7	5,384	5,835	-7.7
MINI brand	3,228	2,543	26.9	3,228	2,543	26.9
TOTAL Group	22,209	20,796	6.8	22,209	20,796	6.8

BMW Motorrad Sales

BMW Motorrad USA started the New Year with a healthy sales growth, reporting an increase of 11.8 percent in January with 661 motorcycles sold compared to the 591 sold in January 2014.

The R 1200 GS Adventure was the best performing model in the month with 126 deliveries and, boosted by the launch of the new-for-2015 R 1200 R, helped drive growth of 61% in R-Series sales with 391 total boxers sold compared to 243 a year ago.

The release of the all-new S 1000 RR also drove increased performance of S-Series models with sales up 6% with 110 units sold compared to 104 in January of 2014.

BMW Motorrad continues to find a larger customer base as a result of an expanding model range and, with 3 further new models primed for launch in the first half of the year, looks well placed to build on a promising start to 2015.

Table 2: Motorcycle Sales BMW of North America, LLC, January 2015

	January  2015	January  2014	%	YTD 2015	YTD 2014	%
BMW Motorcycles	661	591	11.8	661	591	11.8

BMW and Toyota to co-operate on new small car, bringing the MINI Rocketman Concept to market ?

BMW Group and Toyota Motor Corp. may expand their cooperation to include the joint development of a new addition to BMW's Mini range, a German auto magazine reported.

BMW is considering an entry-level car for Mini that would be called the Mini Minor, Autobild said. Toyota could launch its own version of the model, which may be badged as the Starlet, the report said. Automobile magazine also reported on the cooperation talksbetween the two companies.

A Mini spokesman declined to comment on the report, telling Automotive News Europe that it was "mere speculation."

If built, the Minor is expected to be smaller and less expensive than Mini's core model, the three-door hatchback. Based on the Mini Rocketman concept unveiled at the 2011 Geneva auto show, the Minor will be 11-feet, 4-inches long, which is 14.5 inches shorter than the three-door hatch.

With a sticker price of about 13,500 euros ($15,300), the Minor would undercut the three-door Mini hatch by nearly 4,000 euros ($4,500).

It's unclear if the model would be brought to the U.S.

The Mini Minor’s name would revive a moniker first given to the early versions of the car built by the UK brand Morris in the early 1960s.

BMW is expected to add an electric version of the Mini Minor after the first conventionally powered models arrive in 2018 or 2019, the report said.

Mini is shaking up its lineup as it seeks to make the brand profitable. While the Minor would be an addition to the portfolio Mini is likely to discontinue three weak-selling models: the Coupe, Roadster and Paceman.

BMW and Toyota formed an alliance in 2011 to cooperate on diesel engines and have since expanded the collaboration to include fuel cell and battery cell technology, lightweight materials as well as the joint development of an architecture and components for a sports car.

David Jolley

REPORT HERE

MINI to end production of three models in order to stabalise profits across the rest of the range.

To boost Mini’s prospects of long-term profitability parent BMW Group has decided the British brand needs to shrink its lineup to five models from eight. Mini is expected to discontinue three slow-selling vehicles -- the Coupe, Roadster and Paceman – so it can concentrate on the five model lines that accounted for about 95 percent of the 325,000 vehicles it built last year, according to data from IHS Automotive. 

BMW Group does not report individual financial results for the BMW, Mini and Rolls-Royce brands, which has left analysts wondering whether Mini has ever made any money.

“BMW has struggled to make Mini into a profit center from the beginning,” said Max Warburton, an auto analyst at Bernstein Research. He said that Mini’s cars are built on a low-volume platform and that the automaker has undergone “all sorts of complex model line proliferation -- it’s hardly a recipe for making money, at least compared to some of their BMW-branded products.” Mini’s industrial matrix is complex. It builds eight models underpinned by three different platforms in three different plants and has had an average annual volume of about 313,000 units in the last three years.

Warburton expects Mini to become more financially viable once it starts offering a smaller, more consistent range underpinned by a single architecture, which will be shared by BMW brand models such as the 2-series Active Tourer and the next-generation 1 series.

Peter Schwarzenbauer, the BMW board member in charge of Mini, has been a strong advocate for a radical review of the Mini range. “It is important to find the right balance between growth and profitability,” he said late last year while announcing that Mini’s range would be trimmed. Schwarzenbauer said Mini would focus on “superhero” vehicles including the three- and five-door versions of its core hatchback, the Countryman and the Clubman station wagon, which will be renewed this year.

“Like a superhero, each of these cars has its own personality and unique capabilities,” Schwarzenbauer said, without identifying which Minis would be cut and when. However, Oliver Friedmann, the Mini’s head of product management, told Automotive News Europe last year that the Coupe, Roadster and Paceman are not “a priority” in the automaker’s renewal plan. The Coupe and Roadster were conceived as small-volume variants that would help maintain interest in the brand as it transitioned to the fourth generation of its top-seller, the Mini three-door hatch, which debuted last year. IHS Automotive expects Mini to discontinue the Coupe and Roadster this year.

Industrial revamp

Mini also is counting on profits to rise following a radical industrial reorganization of its main factory in Oxford, England, that has boosted daily output to 1,000 vehicles a day from about 700. A key part of that was the switch to making cars using BMW Group’s UKL platform at the plant. The first Mini cars to be underpinned by the UKL architecture are the new three- and five-door hatchbacks. The second-generation Clubman also will use the platform when production starts in Oxford later this year. Oxford builds the Convertible, Coupe and Roadster on the platform BMW created to relaunch Mini in 2001.

Magna Steyr’s plant in Graz, Austria, builds the Countryman and Paceman using a dedicated platform. BMW confirmed it will build another model in Graz after it shifts the next-generation Countryman to another plant. IHS expects production of the new Countryman to start in 2016 at the VDL NedCar plant in Born, Netherlands. VDL began making the Mini three-door hatchback in July 2014 using the UKL platform.

Nick Gibbs and Bloomberg

REPORT HERE

WORLDWIDE SALES - BMW GROUP - Over two million sales make 2014 another record year.

• Record worldwide sales: up 7.9% with a total of 2,117,965 deliveries
• Best ever year for BMW, BMW Motorrad and Rolls-Royce
• MINI sales up 20.7% in December – a new record for the month
• Robertson: New models and balanced global growth key to success
• BMW i sales around 17,800; Krüger: BMW i8 production increased

The BMW Group delivered more than two million vehicles to customers in 2014, the company’s fourth record year in a row. A total of 2,117,965 BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce vehicles were sold, more than ever before in the Group’s history (prev. yr. 1,963,798 / +7.9%). 

All of the company’s brands finished the year strongly with sales in December up 15.2% - a total of 215,217 vehicles were delivered in the last month of the year (prev. yr. 186,786).

Ian Robertson, Member of the Board of Management of BMW AG responsible for Sales and Marketing BMW said, “I am delighted that we achieved our target of selling more than two million vehicles in 2014, a new record for the BMW Group. 

We have seen good growth throughout the year, well spread across all major sales regions. Our new models such as the BMW X4 and BMW 2 Series Active Tourer demonstrate our ability to develop new vehicles which attract new customers to the brand. The popularity of the BMW i3 and BMW i8 shows our game-changing ‘born electric’ strategy is on track. We are now looking forward to building on these successes in 2015.”

2014 was the best year ever for the BMW brand. Deliveries of BMW vehicles totalled 1,811,719, an increase of 9.5% on the previous year (1,655,138). Sales in December also achieved a new high, up 14.2% on the same month last year (177,954 / prev. yr. 155,835).

In its first full year on the market, the BMW 2 Series Coupé has been delivered to a total of 27,933 customers while 13,091 customers have taken delivery of the 2 Series Active Tourer during the three months it has been on sale. 

Sales of the segment-leading BMW 3 Series were up on last year, totalling 476,792 (prev. yr. 467,672 / +2.0%). Deliveries of the BMW 4 Series models totalled 119,580 in 2014. The BMW 5 Series, which also leads it segment globally, saw sales increase 1.7% this year, with a total of 373,053 delivered to customers worldwide (prev. yr. 366,992). The BMW X4, which went on sale in July, has been delivered to 21,688 customers while the new third-generation of the BMW X5 has increased sales by 37.4% compared to last year (147,381 / prev. yr. 107,231).

Around 17,800 customers have taken delivery of an innovative BMW i vehicle in 2014. Global deliveries of the BMW i3 total 16,052; nearly three-quarters of those sales occurred in the second half of the year, following the vehicle’s late-spring market launch in several major markets including the USA. The keys to a total of 1,741 BMW i8s have been handed over to customers since it went on sale in the summer.

Due to the success of the BMW i vehicles, their production continues to ramp up. Harald Krüger, Member of the Board of Management of BMW AG responsible for Production said, “Our production lines in Leipzig are highly flexible and we have switched more production to the i8 to reduce customer waiting times to a better level. Meanwhile, more than 100 BMW i3’s leave the plant each day. The BMW Group is the first automotive company to manufacture using significant quantities of carbon fibre in series production and the success of these cars speaks for itself.”

Despite the change in the core MINI model this year, annual sales remained around last year’s record level with a total of 302,183 vehicles delivered to customers (prev. yr. 305,030 / -1.0%). Peter Schwarzenbauer, Member of the Board of Management of BMW AG responsible for MINI, BMW Motorrad and Rolls-Royce was particularly pleased with how the year ended for the brand. 

“MINI saw its best ever fourth quarter with sales up 17.2% (94,624 / prev. yr. 80,748). It was also a record December with sales increasing 20.7% compared with the same month in 2013 (36,773 / prev. yr. 30,455). Since coming fully onto the market, sales of the new third generation MINI 3-door and the brand new MINI 5-door have been very strong.” 

In December, sales of the 3-door were up 33.9% (16,418 / prev. yr. 12,262) while a total of 6,954 customers took delivery of a 5-door MINI in the last month of 2014. The MINI Countryman saw sales grow 5.0% across the year (106,995 / prev. yr. 101,897) while deliveries of the MINI Paceman totalled 15,567 in 2014, an increase of 6.0% (prev. yr. 14,687).

Rolls-Royce Motor Cars announced record sales results for a fifth consecutive year, with 4,063 units (prev. yr. 3,630 / +11.9%) sold globally during 2014, more than ever before in the brand’s 111-year history. Peter Schwarzenbauer said, “Rolls-Royce has seen strong sales worldwide, with double-digit increases in most regions. This exceptional growth means that deliveries have more than quadrupled since 2009.” Sales were driven by strong orders for Ghost Series II, launched in November, and Wraith, which enjoyed its first full year of sales, while the Phantom remains the company’s pinnacle product.

BMW Motorrad has achieved a fourth successive sales record, selling over 120,000 maxi-scooters and motorcycles for the first time ever, an increase of around 7%. The exact figures will be released on Monday.

The BMW Group achieved growth in all major sales regions in 2014

In Europe, a total of 913,803 BMW and MINI brand vehicles were delivered to customers (prev. yr. 858,990 / +6.4%). All European markets have experienced growth in 2014. The BMW Group’s home market, Germany, saw sales increase 1.7% across the year with 273,433 new vehicles registered (prev. yr. 268,838). Sales in the region’s second biggest market, Great Britain, grew 8.4% in 2014 (204,749 / prev. yr. 188,837) while a total of 67,449 BMW and MINI vehicles were delivered in France, an increase of 5.3% (prev. yr. 64,082).

Sales of BMW and MINI vehicles in Asia grew by 13.8% in 2014 with sales totalling 656,395 (prev. yr. 576,616). This level of sales growth was reflected in the December figures – deliveries in the last month of the year totalled 61,295 (prev. yr. 54,546 / +12.4%). The year saw sales in Mainland China grow by 16.7%, with a total of 455,979 BMW and MINI vehicles delivered to customers (prev. yr. 390,713). Strong sales growth was also experienced in South Korea, where 46,400 customer deliveries were made, an increase of 17.3% on the previous year (39,558).

Sales growth of 3.9% was recorded at year-end in the Americas (481,056 / prev. yr. 462,891). The USA was the region’s main growth driver in 2014, annual sales there were up 5.3% to total 395,850 (prev. yr. 375,782). Canada also saw positive growth of 1.2% (38,188 / prev. yr. 37,723) while sales in Mexico increased by 6.5% compared with the previous year (14,902 / prev. yr. 13,992).

Double-digit growth was recorded in the Middle East region with a total of 30,148 BMW and MINI vehicles sold in 2014, an increase of 22.6% compared with the previous year (24,596). December sales in the region were up 30.4% with a total of 2,511 vehicles delivered to customers in the last month of the year (prev. yr. 1,926).

BMW Group sales in/up to December 2014 at a glance

	In December 2014	Comp. to previous year	Up to/incl. December 2014	Comp. to previous year
BMW Group Automobiles	215,217	+15.2%	2,117,965	+7.9%
BMW	177,954	+14.2%	1,811,719	+9.5%
MINI	36,773	+20.7%	302,183	-0.9%
Rolls-Royce	490	-1.2%	4,063	+11.9%