BMW Group Prepares Dingolfing Plant for G30 Production, Magna Steyr to Supplement Production

BMW Group has announced that the new BMW G30 5 Series will be manufactured and assembled in its Dingolfing plant in Lower Bavaria as the lead plant for its international production network. The last few months has seen an extensive retooling and refurbishment operation costing several hundred million Euros, but also including a new body shop to the west of the plant and a restructuring of the drivetrain unit installation on the production line. 

The Dingolfing plant is known to produce the 7 Series and 6 Series, making it the upper class production centre for BMW products. Given that the G30 5 Series is based off of the CLAR architecture, it makes sense to manufacture it in the same plant as the 7 Series for simplicity of production. More importantly, to supplement production in anticipation of high demand, BMW has contracted Magna Steyr to produce G30 units at their plant in Graz. 

As a plant, Dingolfing is highly competitive- opting to take on production of the 3 Series and 4 Series as well. “The decision to build 3 Series and 4 Series variants here proves that we are competitive and makes us less dependent on the lifecycle of our large model series,” explains Dingolfing Plant Manager Josef Kerscher. However, this also means that the plant cannot handle G30 5 Series production alone, hence the need for Magna Steyr. Over 347,000 units of the 5 Series were sold last year, and total production output of the Dingolfing plant is roughly 350,000 units a year, across all models. 

The G30 5 Series is not the first model to be produced by Magna Steyr: they have also produced the BMW X3 between 2003 and 2010, as well as the MINI Countryman and Paceman models. BMW Group's ties with Magna Steyr and their trust in partnership is what led them to this agreement, and Magna Steyr will begin production of the G30 5 Series in early 2017.