The BMW Group will increase e-component production capacity at its manufacturing base in Leipzig with another eight production lines by 2024. The plant’s two existing battery module lines will be complemented by a further line plus five cell-coating lines. These will be followed by two new high-voltage battery assembly lines due to go on stream in 2024. (Earlier post.)

The battery cells they will process will be manufactured by external suppliers working to BMW Group specifications. First, the lithium-ion cells will be plasma-cleansed before being coated by the specially developed systems to ensure optimum insulation.

Cells are coated with thermally conductive paste for battery module production at BMW Group Plant Leipzig.

After being coated, the cells are assembled to form larger battery modules. In Leipzig this is currently being done on two existing module lines. A third is set to go on stream in the summer of 2023.

Once complete, the battery modules, connectors, control units and cooling aggregates are fitted into an aluminum casing. The number of modules and the size and shape of the casing depend on which vehicle variant they will be used in, so that each vehicle is fitted with the most suitable high-voltage battery. In the future, Plant Leipzig will also assemble high-voltage batteries when two designated assembly lines go on stream in 2024.

The batteries made will power models such as the fully electric version of the MINI Countryman, which will also be built in Leipzig.

From 2013 to the summer of 2022, Leipzig manufactured more than 250,000 fully electric BMW i3 vehicles and more than 20,000 plug-in hybrid BMW i8 sports cars. Both models are now discontinued. The freed-up spaces and the skills of its employees will now be used to produce e-components. More than 700 production staff are already working in battery component production at Plant Leipzig, rising to more than 1,000 by 2024.

We are working consistently to advance the transformation to electromobility, and we continue to develop our e-drive production network to make it happen. From 2024, the entire process chain for high-voltage battery production will run not just at Dingolfing but at Leipzig as well.

—Markus Fallböhmer, Head of Engine at E-Drive Production at BMW AG

Between 2020 and the end of 2024, the BMW Group will have invested more than €800 million in establishing e-component production in Leipzig. In the future, this area of production will take up around 150,000 m² on the site.

The BMW Group is drawing on its global production network to meet the increasing need for e-drive component production capacity. High-voltage batteries and battery components for electric vehicles by the BMW and MINI brands will not only be made in Leipzig but also in Spartanburg, USA, and Shenyang, China. At Plant Rayong, Thailand, high-voltage battery production has been localized with the support of a BMW Group partner.

Meanwhile, Munich is home to the E-Drive Pilot Plant and the Battery Cell Competence Centre, which performs detailed analyses of the value creation processes in battery cell production and advances the relevant technologies. In the not-too-distant future the BMW Group will also be launching its Competence Centre for Battery Cell Production in Parsdorf, just outside Munich. Here, a pilot production system for the near-series manufacture of lithium-ion battery cells will ensure they can be mass-produced to quality, time and cost specifications.