Toyota and BMW Partner for sports car and EV technology
 

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog....reithofer.jpeg

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/06/29/b...r-and-ev-tech/

I can see a Supra succesor on it's way.

Or an over engineered German sports car with Japanese build quality? Really can't go wrong with either, though I prefer German engineering over Japanese.

///M Sports Supra? I can picture all the BMW die-hards crying foul over Toyota mucking up their BMW heritage...lol...

BMW and Toyota are sick of Audi's LeMans dominance and want to kick its ass, maybe?

BMW FRS?
 

http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=711830



BMW Group and Toyota Motor Corporation agree to further strengthen collaboration

29.06.2012

Tokyo/Munich. Akio Toyoda, President of Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC), met today with Norbert Reithofer, Chairman of the Board of Management of BMW AG, at BMW Group headquarters in Munich to announce the planned expansion of their existing cooperation initiated in December last year. The two companies signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) aimed at long-term strategic collaboration in four fields: joint development of a fuel cell system, joint development of architecture and components for a future sports vehicle, collaboration on powertrain electrification and joint research and development on lightweight technologies.

Also today, Norbert Reithofer and Akio Toyoda of TMC both signed a Joint Statement to reconfirm their companies’ shared intention to strengthen the long-term, strategic collaboration between them.

Reithofer said: “We aim to further strengthen our competitive position in sustainable future technologies. We signed an MoU to this effect today. Toyota and the BMW Group share the same strategic vision of sustainable individual future mobility. Together we have a great opportunity to continue leading our industry through this transformation.”

Toyoda added: “BMW and Toyota both want to make ever-better cars. We respect each other. And I think this is shown by our taking the next step only six months since the signing of our initial agreement. Toyota is strong in environment-friendly hybrids and fuel cells. On the other hand, I believe BMW’s strength is in developing sports cars. I am excited to think of the cars that will result from this relationship.”

In March 2012, the BMW Group and TMC signed a binding agreement on collaborative research in the field of next-generation lithium-ion battery cells. In addition, the BMW Group and Toyota Motor Europe entered into a contract under which the BMW Group will supply highly-efficient 1.6 litre and 2.0 litre diesel engines to Toyota Motor Europe, starting in 2014.

Today’s MoU represents the companies’ agreement in December last year to identify and discuss other possible collaborative projects.

I see a Bimeryobaru in the coming future. this could turn out nice. subie and bmw turbo tech is very impresive and known. But bmw high reving NA motor tech:drool:. lets wait and see.

sooo after hearing this, i think our next Supra might just be co-developed with BMW. That is super exciting and highly likely.
IF not, i guess we could be expecting another super sports car ontop of the Supra and 86/FRS, which fits Toyota's goal of 3 sports cars in their line up :happyanim::happyanim::happyanim::happyanim:

Don't get too excited. Toyota and BMW are going to build bloody hybrids.

i think its obvious what's in it for each party. BMW gets fuel cell and hybrid/EV tech and Toyota gets carbon fiber tech (BMW owns part of SGL).

This can only bode well for car enthusiasts :)

Are You Ready for the BIMOTA?
 

Wonder who Toyota might partner with next? Here's something from FOX News: http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2012/...ntcmp=features

new Supra with BMW sourced I6 twin turbo plz

this is all about fuel cell tech... which is unfortunate. BMW went down the road of Hydrogen internal combustion for along time, and they seem to be just dropping it now in favour of fuel cell technology.

BMWs work on the hydrogen internal combustion engine gave me hope for the future.. a future where we'd still have the sporty sounding, heart pumping cars that were fast, loud *and* eco friendly.. cars that we could mod with exhausts, intakes etc.. and still be all about the environment.

Sounds like that aint going to happen now.. pretty soon we'll all be stuck behind the wheel of an electric go kart... ugh.

I could see a Porscharu, drop a flat 6 in there and have a real fun car.

Assuming it looks even half as good as the 86, I would give my left testicle for a car like that.

Any co-developed sports car that BMW and Toyota will make, is more likely going to supply Lexus & BMW with a stronger pure sports brand image.

If any Celica or Supra under the Toyota mark does come into fruition, im putting my bets that BMW will be a large contributor to those revivals vs Subaru.

But im not saying that the co-developed car will be a Supra.

Carbon fiber??? wut?
Fuel cell? Honda comes to mind there, not Toyota.

This is interesting, I thought BMW was partnering with some other people for hybrid stuff.

:bonk:Oh well..............

BMW wants Toyota's battery tech, just like Toyota wanted it from Tesla!

As long as it doesn't come standard with BMW reliability.

So ever since Akio Toyoda took over he has been boasting about changing the branding of Toyota from boring, well built sound vehicles to exciting enthusiast style sportyness. Apparently the engineers at Toyota are so bland they are not able to do this themselves. So Toyota throws a bunch of money and an idea at legitimate sports car companies to build them a car. As a previous owner of a Celica GTS I am pretty dissapointed in them. Of course with out them the BRZ would have never happened sooo, I guess its OK?

It sounds like they're focusing on making a greener, economical sports car. I'm thinking an Electric motor that can actually dish out a good amount of BHP kind of like the Tesla Roadster. It'll probably be a Lexus and piggy-back the Supra's image to market it on the Toyota end. As for BMW, I'm expecting it to be a new electric Z series roadster. I don't see them risking to have their clientele rub elbows with Toyota fans.

yes carbon fiber! BMW bought part of SGL so they can manufacture carbon fiber faster and cheaper. toyota would definitely want in on that. they built their own loom for the LF-A, but that isnt something you use to pound out millions of parts with. their strategic partnership with BMW is both for technology and for sporty "street cred" so to speak.

yes fuel cell! toyota had been all in on gas hybrids and so they havent really pushed for fuel cell tech... until recently. they are already testing fuel cell vehicles and fuel cell hybrids. and their recent concepts have been fuel cells in addition to hybrids. so when the largest manufacturer in the world sets its sights on fuel cells, BMW is gonna want in on that. of course the hybrid tech as well.

both will jointly develop better battery tech and toyota will be buying diesels from bmw. this was the earlier agreement.

bmw had partnered with GM on the 2 mode/active hybrid system. but that was a bust. the X6 active hybrid was a joke. conceptually 2 mode is "better" than HSD in some ways, but in reality, nobody has made it work in a mainstream vehicle. perhaps its physically too large and relegated to trucks/suvs? and how many people buy hybrid trucks/suvs? gm has moved on to the volt's voltec system anyways and bmw just uses the ZF developed hybrid system like all the germans do.

i just hope toyota dont shoot them self in the foot again by branding it a Scion. we all know that Scion dont have high-end or quality cars.

Hopefully Toyota will teach BMW how to build lighweight, rwd (w/ lsd!) sports cars/coupes/sedans. They seem to have completely forgotten how to do it...

Thanks for the news summary, I didn't know about that. I think Toyota probably won't try to adopt BMW's fancier engine tech since it costs too much (piezoelectric injectors, spark plug integrated knock detection, etc.), so I guess the carbon fiber could be something.

HSD would be a bit strange to see in a BMW which usually has some attempt at sporting intentions. If they cooperate on this stuff that would be interesting to see.

off topic: Speaking of hybrids, FHI is producing lithium hybrid supercapacitors, and I have this hunch Subaru might be the first to bring out ultracapacitor based hybrids. Hybrids whose batteries don't wear out after a few years!

I always wanted to see what this type of cooperation can produce. It is now just starting. We will have to wait and see what happends. I don't care what the car is powered by if it is fast and handles well and delivers the performance. Sound is easy, just run a engine sound generator through the stereo system.

BMW 6 Series platform Toyota Supra. Make it happen guys.

Trust me, I never liked the Scion brand itself especially the tC (it's a Honda/Si thing). But I couldn't knock them on reliability and resale value, people have been getting good money on their trade-ins and Scion has been rated pretty highly in reliability in the past years.

That being said, the Toyota brand is pretty boring now. Even the Toyota engineers and execs have admitted it (look at the Wheels magazine feature) and trying to do something about it. The only 'Toyota' I would even consider is the new Camry SE black on black leather with the BBS tires and LED fogs. That think looks pretty sick and luxury inside.

Lexus is their high-end brand and that's not going to change anytime soon.

That being said, I've been on the fence on rebadging my FR-S and I think I'm going to do it next month. Even if I can't replace the Scion part on the steering wheel, I'll still do the wheel caps and front/rear emblems along with taking off 'FR-S'.

fuk that, bring back the old M1 or 8 series.... now that sh!t is beautiful.

I get where you're coming from, but I don't think it's as bad as you're making it out to be. The Tesla Roadster is a beautiful car and sounds like a jet as you're accelerating.

You call it an electric go kart, I call it one step closer to flying cars. :party0030:

Why exactly is that highly likely? I understand Toyota may be embracing BMW's sports car talent-- but Toyota had talent enough to make the Supra great on their own before, why does their collaboration equal a likely Supra? I feel like i may be missing something-- or i'm too cynical on the matter.

i dont think HSD will ever grace a BMW, but i do believe that toyota's early adoption of hybrids has lead them to hoard a bunch of key patents. for example ford has to pay toyota licensing fees of some sort, in order to use their HSD based hybrid system.

well being that toyota owns part of FHI, and the TS030 uses supercapacitors, im sure toyota will be the first...

Well, Subaru is shooting for mild hybrids and light weight, so I think they'll be first but whatever.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_capacitor

The article says FDK's mass produced lithium ultracapacitors are 14 W*h/kg, which is 14*3.6kJ/kg or 50.4 kJ/kg=0.05MJ/kg. This sounds really pathetic, until you consider 10kg is 504kJ. 1/2*1200kg*(30m/s)^2=540kJ. For reference, 30m/s is 67mph. If you try to Ebay ultracapacitors or google some suppliers, the only ones I could find at least were like 5 times worse in terms of energy density. Anyways, enough energy to get from 0 to 60 in a BRZ in something 2/3 the weight of the stock lead acid battery is pretty good, not to mention the huge number of cycles they can survive and being able to be fully discharged and charged in seconds. And these are only the beginning, the newer ones have like 3 times more energy density. I like this kind of technology :D

mild hybrids? :thumbdown: good luck subaru...

imo they are SO far behind in hybrid tech its not funny. unless of course everything is behind the scenes and they somehow come out with revolutionary stuff seemingly outta nowhere... but again, toyota owns like 15% of FHI or something like that. if FHI has such cool tech, toyota may use it for themselves....

Mild hybrid is much, much easier to implement than a full hybrid system, Honda's very first mild hybrid car didn't have any issues I think.

Thanks for this post! I'm curious to see who else will try and dabble into the cross company automotive partnerships (besides the ones we are already aware of). I can't wait to see what they come up with combining both techs at play.

secretly i'm rootin for a Supra!

Hybrids hybrids hybrids gentlemen. Hybrids.