BMW announces entry into Formula-E from 2018-19 

BMW has announced its foray into FIA Formula E Championship, the electric-powered car iteration of the Formula racing championship. The German manufacturer will be the supplier of electric powertrains to the US-based Andretti racing team.

The company, which already acts as the official course and safety vehicle partner, with its all-electric i3 and i8 cars being part of the leading convoy to the nascent Formula-e championship conceptualised in 2014, is among the very few global automotive luxury marques to have taken the lead to enter the all-electric format of the racing series, after Audi and Jaguar.

The Formula-e championship, currently in its third season, boasts of 10 teams, with a lot of the recent start-ups and new entrants in the EV space, including Faraday Future, NEXTEV, and Panasonic, taking up more attention for the showcase of their specialised work, only in the electric mobility area.

The championship already sees participation from some OEMs including Renault, Audi, Jaguar and DS through collaborations: Jaguar-Panasonic, DS-Virgin Racing, and Audi Sport-ABT Schaeffler. BMW has decided to enter the green sport in similar fashion.

BMW will be officially entering the  FIA Formula E Championship, starting Race 5, 2018-19 Series. US-based Team Andretti, which currently, designs and builds its own powertrain, and is using the ATEC-02, for the ongoing season of the championship, is immensely hopeful of upping the ante with better electric drivetrain technology coming in from BMW in 2018.

The German carmaker, will be deploying its advancements in the EV space it has gained so far, developing its electric road models, especially the i3 and the i8, and aims to leverage the new learnings of its BMW i Motorsport division from Formula-e, and horizontally utilise those in the further betterment of its future electric cars.

Mahindra Racing shines at Formula-e
Meanwhile, home-grown automobile major, Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), which has been taking part in the Formula-e championship since its inaugural 2014-15 season, exploring technical capabilities of the Mahindra Electric brand, has had an enthralling ongoing third season of the championship.

The team currently stands at third position with 182 points, behind Audi Sport-ABT Schaeffler (194 pts) and Renault e-DAMS, which is leading the pack with 259 points.

Its two drivers, Felix Rosenqvist (2^nd) and Nick Heidfield (3^rd) clinched the podium positions at the recently concluded penultimate race of the season, held in Brooklyn, USA, over July 15-16.

Mahindra visions an electric future
The company took a conscious decision to be at the heart of the new format of the motorsport, by being one of its founding members, visualising strong advent of an electric future, and displaying strong conviction to move towards it, with some solid takeaways from the track.

According to Anand Mahindra, chairman, M&M, “Cars will still remain as objects of desire and people will use them for recreation, for expression of lifestyle, and so on. Now, will there be a complete move to electric mobility? Maybe, maybe not; maybe, the IC engines will survive to a large extent and the transition will be longer.”

“With the dramatic drop in battery costs and with the dramatic improvement in performance, we’re going to see even that end of vehicles trending more towards electric. It’s a beginning of a major change in the chapter of electric mobility,” he added.

Anand Mahindra also welcomed BMW to the most exciting format of the racing championship, and tweeted, saying, “Welcome @BMW...You’re going to make us all work harder..@FIAformulaE and electric mobility will be the ultimate winner.”

Photographs courtesy: FIA Formula E Championship