Shown in concept form in Guangzhou, China in November last year, the Concept Compact Sedan was confirmed by BMW as the 1-Series sedan in a brief press release accompanied by a lone image of the four-door, three-box saloon.
Said to be ‘an exclusive model tailored and aligned to the needs of Chinese customers’, and ‘solely produced and specifically sold in China’, we can only surmise that this is in reference to BMW Brilliance Automotive Ltd – BMW Group’s joint venture company in China – producing the 1-Series sedan for local consumption only, and not to mean that the 1-Series sedan won’t ever be introduced to other markets in the foreseeable future. After all, an affordable, entry-level BMW sedan could potentially be a hit in US and Asian markets, case in point being the Audi A3 sedan and the Mercedes-Benz CLA.
Curiously, no technical specification is forthcoming but since the release mentions the BMW X1, 2-Series Active Tourer in the same breath as the 1-Series sedan, we can safety assume that the compact four-door is based on the UKL platform that spawns FWD and AWD versions of compact BMWs and MINIs, so you can expect the interior to be similar in design as the Active Tourer and to have good legroom at the back.
4-Series updated, CKD X6 gets ‘centenary’ price
Just like the facelifted F30 3-Series, the F32 Coupe and F36 Gran Coupe have now been updated with the new B48 four-cylinder engine in different tunes. The range now starts with the 184hp/270Nm 420i Coupe at RM297,800 (or RM317,800 for the Sport variant), the 252hp/350Nm 430i Sport at RM356,800 (or RM386,800 for the M-Sport variant) and the similarly powered 430i four-door Gran Coupe M-Sport at RM416,800. And in conjunction with BMW’s centenary celebration, the locally-assembled X6 xDrive35i is now available at RM628,800 – a RM38,000 reduction from its last announced sticker price.
