Could Car Maker Mini be Eyeing a Shift to the Two-Wheeled Sector?
Well, the CEO of Mini, Stefanie Wurst, has said she would ‘consider’ a switch, if there was an appetite for it
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Mini is one of the most storied and famous brands from the world of four-wheels. From giant-killing performances on track, to steam-rolling the opposition in rallying, the little car built a big name for itself.
And it’s still going strong more than 60 years later, albeit now under German (BMW) ownership, and not quite as ‘mini’ as it once was. It is though still building cars, has a fairly expansive range and makes both petrol and electric models.
And it’s the electric models, and the brand’s ownership via BMW, that is creating this piece of news, that the CEO of the Mini brand has spoken about the company making electric motorcycles, and she isn’t ruling it out.
The BMW CE 02 like one Ms Wurst tested
Ms Wurst was recently invited to try out the BMW CE 02, and she seems to have enjoyed it, writing on LinkedIn ‘I swapped four wheels for two and jumped on the fully electric new BMW Motorrad CE 02 for a thrilling test ride,’ and going on to say ‘You can tell by the smile on my face how much I loved it!’
She was further quizzed on the possibility of a switch to making two-wheelers (alongside cars) by the automotive magazine AutoExpress. "We have them in our family with BMW Motorrad.” she said, "If we were to do something I would look into the family first and I think this is something I find interesting … If I have interest in our markets, this is something I would consider”.
Will the BMW-owned auto maker, Mini, make the switch to two-wheels?
So basically, if people will buy it, they will build. And building it is probably the easiest part of this process. With BMW’s CE 02 already developed, tested and homologated, a re-branded and re-styled version of the lightweight city bike would surely be a fairly easy model to bring to market. And Mini already has a fiercely loyal customer base, a desirable brand profile and a vast global dealership network.
Probably the biggest problem to overcome is electric bike sales being fairly low at the moment. We’ve already seen two electric bike makers go belly up in 2024, Arc and Cake, although smaller bikes like the CE 02 and the Maeving RM1 seem to be a bit more immune to the problem. That could be something that sways the Mini CEO into dipping a toe in the electric motorcycle sector.
