Recently, BMW Group Global CEO Oliver Zipzer announced at the 2026 fiscal year meeting that because L3 autonomous driving technology has not yet achieved commercial profitability, BMW will temporarily lower the research and development priority of the project.And the facelifted 7 Series models launched in April this year will no longer be equipped with the Personal Pilot L3 assisted driving system.
This adjustment stems from various practical considerations.
The current BMW 7 Series will be equipped with an L3 level autonomous driving system in November 2023. However, due to the high cost (the option price in Germany is as high as 6,000 euros), the limited use scenarios (only supports specific highway sections, and the speed limit is 60km/h), and the low user acceptance, BMW finally decided to abandon this technology.
BMW's 2025 financial report data shows that the group's annual revenue was 133.45 billion euros, a year-on-year decrease of 6.3%.
Pre-tax profit was 10.236 billion euros, a year-on-year decrease of 6.7%; net profit was 7.45 billion euros, a year-on-year decrease of 3.0%.
At the same time, the group expects that profitability will be difficult to significantly improve in 2026. Rising tariff costs and intensifying competition in the Chinese market will continue to bring profit pressure.
However, BMW also emphasized that this move is not to abandon the long-term research and development of high-end autonomous driving technology, but to continue to advance after its business model becomes more mature.
Looking into the future, the group will continue to promote the popularization of "new generation" technology in all product series, and plans to launch more than 40 new or revised models by 2027.
