BMW buys Alpina
Monday, 14 March 2022
Back in 1962 Burkard Bovensiepen developed a carburettor for the BMW 1500 that was raved about by the automotive press. It also impressed Paul G. Hahnemann, BMW's legendary sales boss, so much that by 1964 BMW gave it the official nod by awarding vehicles fitted with it a full factory guarantee.
And that was the beginning of Alpina, a brand that has spent the last 57 years building fast BMWs with official factory blessing.
And now BMW has made things even more official by purchasing Alpina, with an eye to taking it in-house by 2025, much in the way Mercedes-Benz has done with its long-term aftermarket tweaker AMG.
The BMW Group released a statement saying that the “conclusion of the transaction is still subject to various suspensive conditions – in particular, approval by the responsible antitrust authorities”, but that the long-standing cooperation agreement between the two companies that was extended for five years in late 2020 will expire on the 31st of December 2025.
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The official plan is for Alpina to continue to build versions of existing BMW models in the Barvarian town of Buchloe until 2025, at which point the brand will be fully absorbed into BMW. While further details of what will happen after that haven’t been revealed, we would assume that development and production will then be handled by BMW's facilities.
The Bovensiepen family will also create a new company bearing its name, which will continue to work with classic cars but which will also offer engineering consultancy services to other carmakers as well as BMW.
“We recognised the challenges facing the automotive industry early on and are now setting the right course for Alpina and for our family firm,” said Andreas Bovensiepen, co-managing director of Alpina Burkard Bovensiepen GmbH + Co. KG.
”This marks the beginning of a new chapter. Both the Alpina brand and our company are extremely desirable. We made a conscious decision not to sell Alpina to just any manufacturer, because BMW and Alpina have worked together and trusted one another for decades. That is why it is the right decision strategically for the Alpina brand to be managed by the BMW Group in the future.”
While the first company called Alpina started by the Bovensiepen family made typewriters and folded after a failed move into textiles, Alpina Bovensiepen GmbH + Co. KG was officially founded on 1 January 1965 and was active in BMW tuning and motorsports from the 1960s onwards.
The company began manufacturing passenger cars based on BMW products in 1978, and since 1983 has been registered as an official automotive manufacturer with the German Federal Motor Transport Authority. It currently employs around 300 people.
Alpina’s current model line up consists of modified versions of BMW’s 3, 5, 7 and 8 Series sedans, as well as the X3, X4 and X7 SUVs. The company produced around 2000 vehicles in 2021, selling in Germany and Europe, as well as Japan, the US, and the Middle East. Interestingly, the Bovensiepen family’s second main area of activity is the Alpina wine business.