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A photo from the BMW i3 Sales Start in November 2013. Pictured are the first group of people to take delivery of an i3 According to InsideEVs , worldwide i3 sales have passed the 10,000 unit mark, just shy of one year from the i3's European launch. It wasn't until May of this year that the i3 became available in the US, and after a couple months of relatively  slow sales, the i3 has had two consecutive months with sales greater then 1,000 units and October is expected to continue that trend. Inside EVs also states that BMW claims they are now selling about 3,000 i3s per month and if that is correct, and the trend continues, then the second year sales will see over 30,000 i3s hit the streets. That figure is pretty much what has been said to be BMW's target for annual i3 sales, and if they indeed hit it in the second year of production then that has to be considered a success. Me and my client adviser, Manny Antunes of JMK BMW. I took delivery of the first i3 REx in the US ba...

Bloomberg News reported this morning that BMW has raised i3 production an additional 43%. They got that information directly from BMW board member and production chief, Harold Krueger. What that means is instead of the 70 units a day that was previously reported, BMW is now making 100 i3's every day which amounts to around 23,000 units per year. They already have built 5,000 cars in 2014 which works out just about exactly to the 70 units a day that BMW claimed they were making. This announcement from Krueger comes only a couple weeks after it was revealed that BMW has ordered additional molding machines that make body shell components. The additional equipment obviously hasn't been installed yet so it's likely when it is installed BMW will have the ability to increase production even further. This is all good news for BMW and the EV industry in general, as it continues to demonstrate that there is definitely a healthy demand for electric cars that people find desirable.

Virtually every facet of the i3's manufacturing process is different and BMW is evidently struggling to manage setbacks According to Jay Cole over at insideevs.com i3 production is currently 50% lower than expected at this point in time. Cole's source is Manager Magazine Online , a German Publication, which states the high rejection rate of the carbon fiber parts made for the car. The article goes on to say that BMW's recent announcement that the company will be investing another 100 million euros to increase the production of carbon fiber is tied to this issue. Manager also says BMW is only churning out 70 i3's per day which is about half of what they were hoping to be making by now. BMW began i3 production in October so they are four months in and now have over 11,000 i3's on backorder. Plus, US sales are only just beginning so it would appear that even if BMW gets the current problems solved in short order (and that's a big "if"), it will still pr...