BMW’s New CEO Urges Employees To Chase Down Rivals

BMW has a new chief executive and Oliver Zipse is urging the company’s employees to help it overtake arch-rival Mercedes-Benz.

Shortly after Harald Krueger stepped down from his position and Zipse was promoted, the new chief executive sent an email to staff urging them to find innovative ways to make the company better than its rivals, Auto News reports.

“Instead of blaming the current situation, conditions, political landscape or particular individuals, a positive spirit will enable us to seize the opportunities available to us. Such a positive spirit will be reflected in our culture: the harder the job, the more innovative our solution,” Zipse wrote.

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“We don’t always have to be first, but we most certainly have to be far better than our competitors in everything that we do. This applies not only to our products and services, but also to our processes and structures, as well as our costs.”

Zipse added that BMW’s ability to build electric and combustion-engined cars on the same production line gives it a significant competitive advantage over rivals because it can scale up or slow down production of electric vehicles depending on demand.

BMW had been leading the charge of the German three in the race towards electrification with the launch of the i3 in 2013 and the i8 in 2014. However, Mercedes-Benz and Audi soon closed the gap and both now have enticing all-electric crossovers on the market, the EQC and e-Tron, while BMW has yet to even enter this burgeoning segment.