BMW celebrates 25 years in Silicon Valley

The power of innovation, the magic of a location: as early as 1998, exactly 25 years ago, BMW recognized how important external impulses are for securing innovation leadership. At that time, the Technology Center was opened in Silicon Valley, a few years after the Designworks studio in Santa Monica near Los Angeles had been taken over.

Nowhere else do creativity, lifestyle and intelligence come together in such a congenial way as in the strip of land on San Francisco Bay, at the foot of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Stanford University is located here, and numerous start-ups and technology companies have their headquarters here. For BMW, it's all about tapping into the streams of creativity and recruiting employees from among the best. The Bavarians draw on their unrivaled image: working for BMW is considered a distinction even in fast-paced California.

To celebrate the 25th anniversary, Board Member for Development Frank Weber brought along the New Class concept car, a preview of a completely new electric model series that will be launched on the market in 2025 and is intended to be as big a leap for BMW as the original New Class was half a century ago. This came onto the market as the 1500, it was available with a displacement of up to two liters, the legendary 02 series was derived from it, as were the iconic coupés that led to the E9 series.

The insights that BMW provides into its development are promising. Under the name One Gemini, the company is working on a new battery generation that combines two different battery architectures: one of them is responsible for high performance on short journeys, while the other is intended as a "range extender" to allow long ranges. Almost 1000 kilometers have already been achieved in tests.

Various prototypes demonstrate the potential of augmented and virtual reality, which in future will be able to feed information to the driver and also transport passengers into relaxing worlds.

The "Intelligent Personal Assistant", which is entering its next evolutionary stage in the new Mini, is intended to both simplify interaction with the car and make it more entertaining as required. Artificial intelligence will also be used in the future, with the trick being to establish car-specific "guard rails": Playfulness and distraction do not belong in the car.

Topics such as interior scenting are also currently being taken up again in Silicon Valley. Although this already existed in the previous seven-series, the prototype now on show combines a wider range of fragrances with corresponding sound and video worlds.

The trick for BMW in the future will be to combine the innovations from Silicon Valley with corresponding research from other parts of the world. It is not only in China that similarly competent centers are emerging; BMW itself is already making increasing use of them. But California's appeal is likely to remain unbeatable in the future - and the location will therefore remain indispensable. (aum/jm)