Yahoo Autos BMW Is Replacing the M760Li With an All-Electric Super Sedan Called the i7 M70
BMW revealed its all-new 7-Series on Wednesday, giving us our best look yet at the company’s future. Leading the charge is the all-electric i7, sporting 536 hp from a 101.7 kWh battery and two motors. But it won’t be the only all-electric 7-Series on offer, according to Pieter Nota, a member of BMW’s management board who heads up communications, brands, and sales.
During a closed-door presentation held in New York for the press before the car’s debut Wednesday, Nota confirmed to Road & Track that an even more capable i7 variant is in the pipeline.
“I can reveal that there will be a fully electric vehicle positioned above the i7 xDrive60 that you saw today,” Nota said. “And that will be an M Performance vehicle.”
Nota and other brand representatives at the roundtable said this more powerful i7, known as the i7 M70, would be a direct replacement for the V-12-powered M760Li xDrive, which is set to go out of production in June 2022 with a final run of 12 limited-edition cars. Like that car, we expect this new electric version to split the difference in performance between the normal i7 and a full-on M car. Think i4 M50 or M440i.
While Nota did not go into detail about the all-electric i7 M70, he made it clear EVs were the future for BMW’s most capable trims.
“The most powerful BMW vehicles will be fully electric going forward,” Nota said.
In a press release following the 2023 7-Series reveal, BMW said the M70 will use front and rear motors to produce over 600 hp and 737 lb-ft of torque. The company promises a 0-62 time over under four seconds, but has yet to release any info on pricing. We expect it to start in the $160,000 range. It will likely hit dealers in 2023.
An M760Li replacement isn’t the only new 7-Series we expect BMW to reveal in the near future. Alpina, the German tuning company absorbed into BMW Group in March 2022, has released its own versions of the 7-Series since the Eighties. There's no reason that will stop with this newest car. While Alpina’s version will likely carry on using the B7 nameplate, it’s not yet known whether it will be based on a gas-powered 7-Series or the all-electric i7. Going by what Nota's said here, we're betting on the latter.
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