BMW

Bayerische Motoren Werke, BMW short,  ( Dutch : Bavarian engine factories) is a German company from Munich that cars and motorcycles produces. The company is located in Munich, where also a factory and the BMW Museum stands. BMW is the parent company of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, the company also manufactures automobiles under the name Mini . In 2014, BMW produced for the first time in company history more than 2 million vehicles. BMW sells its motorcycles under the brandBMW Motorrad . Until 2013 BMW also owned Husqvarna .

Content

 * 1 History
 * 1.1 World War I
 * 1.2 World War II
 * 1.3 After World War II
 * 1.3.1 Autosport
 * 2 Shareholders
 * 3 Logo
 * 4 Locations
 * Timeline 5 cars (1952 to present)
 * 6 See also
 * 7 External link

History [ edit ]
Bayerische Motoren Werke was in October 1913 by Karl Friedrich Rapp founded as aircraft engine factory under the name Rapp Motoren Werke. If the location Milbertshofendistrict in Munich was chosen near the Flugmaschinenfabrik Gustav Otto, a German aircraft factory Gustav Otto and forerunner of the Bayerische Flugzeug Werke .

War [ edit ]
In 1916 the company obtained a contract to build V12 engines for Austria-Hungary . Rapp was looking for additional capital and found that Camillo Castiglioni and Max Friz . Too rapid expansion caused problems, and Rapp left the company and the company was renamed Bayerische Motoren Werke GmbH. The leadership of the company was taken over by Franz Josef Popp, and in 1918 the company name was changed to BMW AG.

After the First World War, the factory was temporarily closed, and reopened after BMW had to cease production of aircraft engines and henceforth was mainly produce railway brakes. After selling the company to Knorr-Bremse buys former majority shareholder Camillo Castiglioni in 1922, the name BMW back and sells them to theBayerische Flugzeug Werke . Bayerische Motoren Werke sees the launch date of its legal predecessor Bayerische Flugzeug Werke ( March 7 1916 ) as its founding date.

In 1928 BMW took the vehicle factory Eisenach AG about, where the tiny Dixi built. This was for Bayerische Motoren Werke start as carmaker. In March 1929, BMW produced the first car, the BMW 3/15, a derivative of the Austin Seven. BMW's first real cars were produced from 1933. These were more sophisticated six-cylinder sports cars and sedans. Especially the 327 saloon and 328 roadster, fast 2-liter cars were very advanced for their time. Thanks in these models BMW got a name as a builder of sports cars.

World War II [ edit ]
During the Second World War, BMW was a major supplier of engines to the Luftwaffe and motorcycles and other vehicles for the Wehrmacht . One of the engine types was 801, one of the most powerful engines in those days. A type sidecar was Wehrmachtsgespann mentioned. Until 1945 there were more than 30,000 produced in total. The BMW plant in Eisenach BMW has also conducted research into jet engines, and has missiles based weapons produced.

Bayerische Motoren Werke factories were heavily bombed by the end of the war. The factory in Munich was destroyed for the most part. The factories in eastern Germany ( Eisenach , Dürrerhof , Basdorf and Zühlsdorf ) were the Soviet Union seized. The Soviets were the BMW design reverse engineer, but it was actually just cars and the single-cylinder BMW R35 . Therefore, the brands IMZ-Ural and Dnepr no copies of the Eisenach produced Wehrmachtsgespann. The Soviet boxer machines were counterfeit BMW R71 sidecar combinations, which were all purchased in 1939 through Swedish intermediaries. Russia produces the type called IMZ-Ural , Ukraineunder the name Dnepr ; and Kazakhstan under the name Kozak.

After World War II [ edit ]
Employee at the BMW plant in 1968, working on a 1600 model

After the war BMW recovered. The company mainly drove the construction of motorcycles. Built after the war, mainly big sports cars and limousines with V8 engine that sparsely were sold. The plant therefore came to the brink of bankruptcy. Salvation came in the form of a three-wheeled "scooter" licensed by the Italian Iso, the BMW Isetta and the BMW 700. The breakthrough came with the BMW 1500 in 1961. In the mid-sixties had BMW need for additional capacity, while development and production at Glaswere just too high. BMW took the firm Glass Dingolfing in November 1966 for about 9.1 million DM. Some glass models were still held annually in production, such as the 1700 GT Coupe and 1600 BMW Coupe continued, and some Goggomobil models. Glass 3000 V8 was taken precisely in production, and was not even a real BMW appearance, except for the logo on the grille. In 1969 was the last Goggomobil the band in Dingolfing. From that time were still BMWs exclusively produced here. Since then BMW has built a range of sporty sedans and coupes that were available with many different engines, which was particularly in the sixties.The brand created a new genre with the 323i from 1977, a relatively small sedan with rear-wheel drive and a six-cylinder petrol engine under the hood. Typical of BMW cars is that most of their cars are rear-wheel drive, all-wheel drive is now also available on many models. Like many other car manufacturers BMW found itself in conflict forced to expand the competition. The company took over in 1994, the British Rover about. In 1998, BMW lost the battle for Rolls-Royce from Volkswagen, but clinched the rights to the name Rolls-Royce, which appeared to be based at Rolls-Royce Aerospace, the nose of Volkswagen road. Rover proved a bad bargain and was done in two parts of the hand in March 2000, with BMW only the rights to the Mini retained. In 2002, BMW released a retro version of the old Mini on the market that it is successful.

Also in the motorcycle industry BMW did good business, the famous twin-cylinder two-wheelers were from the sixties not only popular with public authorities, and especially with the general public. Early eighties BMW made ​​the mistake the popular boxer wanting to drop in favor of 3- and 4-cylinder in-line blocks, but that decision has been reversed soon after stormy protests. BMW has since the typical boxer engine developed into a modern block with 4 valves per cylinder and dual spark plug.BMW is still an independent company and is not part of an overall parent.

Autosport [ edit ]
BMW has grown by motorsport. There are countless successes achieved in the main national and international competitions in the field of touring cars. Typical of BMW was especially the relationship between the racing cars on the one hand and the series-produced cars on the other hand, says Niki Lauda. In Formula 1 BMW has been particularly successful as an engine supplier of the English Brabham team. With the strong 1.5-liter four cylinder turbocharged Nelson Piquet became world champion in 1983. It was the first time in the history of Formula 1 that a car equipped with a turbo engine became world champion. Later BMW was an engine supplier for the teamBMW-Williams between 2000 and 2005. BMW stopped the collaboration with Williams after the season of 2005. It bought the F1 team of Peter Sauber for the start of the 2006 season Until season 2009 BMW owner of the team BMW Sauber . BMW has its own racing series in the Netherlands : the BMW 130i Cup .

Shareholders [ edit ]
BMW is a publicly traded company with a free float of approximately 53%. On December 31, 2012, the major shareholders Stefan Quandt (17.4% of the shares), Johanna Quandt (16.7%) and Susanne Klatten (12.6%).

Logo [ edit ]
The logo consists of a black ring with the capital letters BMW. Inside is a blue and white checkered field, a reference to the coat of arms of Bavaria . After BMW aircraft engines went fabricate, originated the story that the logo is a reference to a propeller. BMW itself also kept this story alive. Only in 2005 the true origins of the logo was again known. The colors of the logo store the colors of the southern German state of Bavaria (where in Munich made ​​a large part of the BMWs). [3]

[Locations edit ]
The headquarters of Bayerische Motoren Werke in Munich is the BMW Four-cylinder, a building that is its name in terms of form. The building is by the Austrian architectKarl Schwanzer designed. Another building, also by means of Schwanzer, the BMW Museum . Both buildings were completed before the start of the 1972 Summer Olympics .

A new branch in Munich for the group's BMW Welt, a complex that was developed by the architect group Coop Himmelb (l) au . BMW has in mind with this building to strengthen the dialogue with the customer and generate a perception experience when they pick up their new vehicle. The building also provides gourmet care, information services and shops with BMW parts.

In 1994, BMW opened in the US state South Carolina its first assembly plant in the Americas: BMW Manufacturing Co. Spartanburg .