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| BMW,
GM and DaimlerChrysler tie up to develop hybrid engines
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Our
Corporate Bureau
08 September 2005 |
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Detroit: BMW along with General Motors Corp.
and DaimlerChrysler AG will join up in a joint effort
to develop fuel-saving hybrid engines, the companies
announced Wednesday.
Munich, Germany-based BMW Group has signed a memorandum
of understanding with GM and DaimlerChrysler and expects
to finalize the agreement later this year. GM and DaimlerChrysler
finalized their own hybrid partnership last month, under
which GM will be the lead designer of hybrid engines
for rear-wheel and all-wheel-drive, full-size trucks
and sport-utility vehicles, front-wheel-drive cars and
crossover vehicles. DaimlerChrysler will be the lead
designer of hybrid engines for rear-wheel-drive luxury
cars.
A GM official said that automakers are considering adding
more companies to the hybrid partnership. According
to a BMW official the creation of a shared technology
platform for hybrid drives would allow the companies
to more quickly integrate the best technologies on the
market.
In a two-mode hybrid system, a vehicle can be powered
either by two electric motors or by the combustion engine,
or the systems can be used simultaneously. Toyota Motor
Corp. and Honda Motor Co. now dominate the two-mode
hybrid market. Ford Motor Co. also sells two sport-utility
vehicles that use the technology.
Hybrid
vehicles represented less than one percent of U.S. sales
last year, but they doubled from the year before to
a total of 83,153.
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