BMW’s high-performance M division has revealed details of a new fully electric prototype vehicle, which debuts a quad-motor powertrain. Does this preview a battery-powered M3 and M4?

We already know the soon-to-be-revealed new BMW M2 coupé will be the final full-fat M car powered by a pure combustion engine. So, what’s next? Well, the upcoming BMW XM will be the M division’s first hybrid, before things go fully electric.

In fact, BMW M has now – in its 50th year of existence – revealed a few details of a fresh prototype vehicle, based on the i4 M50 but upgrading to four electric motors. The Munich-based firm’s high-performance division says this concept opens the “next chapter in its transformation towards electric mobility”. Are we looking at a test bed for a battery-powered M3 and M4?

Well, the clues are certainly there. The prototype’s all-wheel-drive system comprises four electric motors and an integrated driving dynamics control system, which together provide what BMW M terms “an unprecedented level of performance and experience”.

BMW M says it is in the “midst of a transformation process towards electric mobility” which not only “preserves the unmistakable performance characteristics of its models, but at the same time enriches them with new facets”.

“On our anniversary, we are not only looking back, but above all also looking forward. Before the end of the year, production of the BMW XM, our first high-performance car featuring a V8 M hybrid drive, will commence,” said Franciscus van Meel, Chairman of the Board of Management of BMW M GmbH.

A closer look at the quad-motor electric prototype

The prototype’s i4 M50 body has been modified “in typical BMW M style”, gaining wider wheel arches over specifically manufactured high-performance front and rear axles. The vehicle’s front end features an adapted M4 body strut concept for “particularly high torsional rigidity in extremely dynamic driving situations”.

But the core of the high-performance drive system is the electric M xDrive all-wheel-drive system, with the four electric motors connected to a central control unit. BMW M claims the fact each wheel is independently driven by an electric motor “opens up completely new possibilities for infinitely variable, extremely precise and at the same time very fast distribution of drive torque”. The result, says the company, is a level of dynamics “unattainable using conventional drive systems”, complete with “significantly higher cornering speeds”.

“Electrification opens up completely new degrees of freedom for us to create M-typical dynamics. And we can already see that we can exploit this potential to the maximum, so that our high-performance sports cars will continue to offer the M-typical and incomparable combination of dynamics, agility and precision in the locally emission-free future,” promised Dirk Häcker, Head of Development at BMW M GmbH.