The BMW Group’s Steyr facility has reached a significant milestone with the completion of new production halls dedicated to the future of e-drive manufacturing. Initiated in September 2022, the construction phase culminated in a topping-out ceremony exactly one year later, showcasing the 60,000 square meters of production space within the 105 by 150-meter building. “The development and setup of our production facility for the Neue Klasse e-drives are progressing exactly as planned. We are now embarking on the next critical phase, which is just as challenging as the construction of the production halls,” stated Helmut Hochsteiner, the Head of Electric Drives at the BMW Group site in Steyr.
In preparation for the pre-series production set to start in July of this year, the next few months will see the installation of approximately 300 pieces of plant and machinery, many custom-built for this project. These include a vast array of equipment sizes, from smaller units to the significant ‘marriage’ station extending over 30 meters. This station will employ four robots and additional systems to attach the transmission to the main motor efficiently.
Klaus von Moltke, Senior Vice President of Engine Production at BMW AG and Plant Director of Steyr, highlighted the project’s financial scope: “Our investment of over 500 million euros in the Steyr facility’s plant and equipment underscores the BMW Group’s dedication to this site. We are on track to start series production of e-drives for the Neue Klasse by autumn of 2025.”
The assembly hall’s first piece of equipment, a crane for moving power electronics components from the first-floor clean room—where inverters are assembled—to the ground floor for final assembly, was installed at the end of January. This setup paves the way for the integration of the inverter and e-drive. By 2030, the BMW Group plans to invest around 1 billion euros in e-drive production at Steyr, aiming to produce over 600,000 e-drives annually alongside diesel and petrol engines.