BMW’s i3 was a ground-breaking EV that introduced a number of new technologies when it went on sale in 2014. It was always a bit of a niche vehicle—a small but classy city car—and sales in the US have been fairly modest. In some European markets, however, it’s been a pretty big hit, and BMW has seen fit to keep it in production even as most of the other early EV models of its era fell by the wayside.

BMW has faced a lot of criticism for failing to follow up on the market leadership it seized with the i3—the automaker is only now getting serious about a new generation of EVs. Be that as it may, the Bavarian brand is moving on to bigger and better things, and has announced the end of serial production of the i3.

The BMW Group Plant in Leipzig, Germany, where all i3s were produced, recently built unit #250,000. The futuristic compact EV has been sold in more than 74 countries, and BMW says that it gained a large share of the EV segment in many markets, and brought many new customers to the brand.

The Leipzig plant will continue to be a center of BMW’s electric efforts. The company has been producing high-voltage battery modules there since May 2021, and “further e-drive components will be manufactured there with immediate effect.” Next year, the next generation of the electric MINI Countryman will be manufactured at Leipzig.

Source: BMW