BMW Group Chief Financial Officer Walter Mertl said at a media roundtable on Monday that the company has passed a tipping point in sales of internal combustion engine vehicles and that sales growth is now mainly coming from electric vehicles.
“The tipping point has been reached for internal combustion engines,” Myrtle said, adding that in his view, that tipping point was passed last year.
"Sales of internal combustion vehicles will continue to remain flat for now and then decline slightly," he predicted, noting that upcoming environmental regulations would limit sales of such vehicles.
BMW last year achieved a target of 15% of sales of pure electric vehicles and plans to increase this to 33% by 2026, while launching six new models on its Neue Klasse pure electric vehicle production line, a multi-billion-euro effort to close the technology gap with rivals.
However, Myrtle said BMW won't have the same profit margins on combustion engine cars and pure electric vehicles until at least 2026, noting the higher cost of introducing new battery technology for later models.
Cars in certain price ranges may also be discounted, he said, without giving further details.
He added that BMW maintained its previously announced target of selling 3 million vehicles by 2030 and achieving a profit margin of 8-10% in the automotive business, which is a conservative target and lower than its expected profit margin of about 10.3% in 2023.