WHAT ALPINA DOES NEXT

After more than 50 years upgrading and often upstaging BMW’s finest, Alpina is being taken over by the Munich mothership. Matt Prior asks its boss why he’s selling up and what it means for both the Buchloe brand and its cars

It was the first time that BMW had approached the owners of Alpina to ask them if they would like to sell the brand, but the timing was astute. “The risks for small manufacturers are going up massively,” says Andreas Bovensiepen, who with his brother Florian runs Alpina, the company their father founded to tune BMWs back in 1965. “But the opportunities aren’t increasing in the same way.” Over an hour with Autocar, Bovensiepen outlines the dilemma facing Alpina, which from its modest tuning and racing roots has become an independent manufacturer in its own right, making fast, luxurious and discreet cars that are 80% finished in BMW factories, owing to a close partnership with the Munich firm. There’s a burgeoning order book: Alpina sold a record 2000 cars last…

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Autocar (Digital) - 1 Issue, August 3, 2022

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