motor

Wutputt · 10-06-2004, 12:14 PM

BMW still owns Mini and they used to own MG-Rover and Land Rover, like greg.little said. Btw, BMW owns Rolls-Royce not for decades. Only since 1 January 2003 BMW owns the hole company(*), if we're talking about cars. When talking about RR aircraft engines, it's a different case.

*: I though they already bought the trademark in 1998 when VW bought Bentley but also wanted to buy RR

ZfrkS62 · 10-06-2004, 12:17 PM

i forgot about mini

ops: I could have sworn the owned RR alot longer than that, but i guess i could have gotten mixed up because of the aircraft engines.

how long ago did this Rover ownership and selling take place?

Wutputt · 10-06-2004, 12:55 PM

In 1994 BMW bought Rover including MG, Mini and Land Rover. But the marriage went sour in 2000. MG and Rover were sold to a British investment group, Phoenix. Land Rover was sold to Ford, who positioned ir within PAG and BMW kept Mini.

ZfrkS62 · 10-06-2004, 01:19 PM

ah...ok. makes sense now. Kinda glad Mini is the only one they kept.

Paco · 10-06-2004, 07:16 PM

Don't forget the BMW 4.4 V8 in the Morgan Aero 8, which is a vital part of the car.
Also Wiesmann relies heavily on BMW-technology and are more than just modifiers.
The infamous McLaren F1 of course sported one of the best engines ever. And that was a BMW also...

Furthermore, there are more car manufactureres like Wiesman that rely on one particular marque. Rhinspeed uses Porsche technology, Abarth was an independent car builder that did a lot for FIAT later on and Ssang Yong builds all it's (ugly) SUV's on Mercedes technology. Then we also have Indian-based Mahindra which incidently belongs to DaimlerChrysler and is based on Willys Jeep technology.

Lastly, you have independent car builders like Pinifarina, Guigaro and Bertone that work for several car manufacturers.

After this there is an incredible amount of 'one-offs' that rely on others technology. Some special cars like the BMW Glas or the weird-looking Porsche Sbarro. Others were just rebadged cars from other marques (so no in-company rebadging) like the illustrous SAAB 600 (Lancia Delta).

Wutputt · 10-07-2004, 10:58 AM

You have loads of connections and part/engine buying stuff in the automotive industry. For instance Mini uses (modified) Chrysler petrol engines and Toyota diesel engines (the next Mini will use PSA diesels). Lotus used to use Rover K-series engines for their Elise, now it are Toyota engines and the transmission of the Esprit always was a (modified) R25 transmission. And we can keep going on for a long time without even mentioning automotive supplier relations.

Paco · 10-07-2004, 07:03 PM

Mini getting PSA-diesels?

I remember reading something about that. However, You'd think they could use the BMW-diesel for that. Or is the 2-litre too big?
PSA delivers well-performing little diesels, though.

My god, where will we all find these engines then? Ford, Mazda, Peugeot, Citroen, Mini. What about the small Mitsubishi and Forfour Smart? What diesels would they get? Also PSA? DaimlerChrysler has only the 1.7 CDI. Maybe too big?

oldsnail · 10-07-2004, 10:33 PM

NISSAN:
Owned by Renault (France) - 44.4 %
Subsidiary Infiniti (Brand name)
Nissan Diesel (truck)