For some reason the BMW X6 was a stroke of brilliance from the Bavarian brand. It’s a vehicle that makes aboslutely no sense and that’s probably why it’s so popular. In fact, it is indeed so popular that BMW actually was able to carve out another vehicle segment – one that BMW’s rivals desperately want a piece of with Acura trying its hand not-so-successfully, Audi lning up its Q6 for production soon, and Mercedes-Benz is planning on throwing its hat into the fray.
It isn’t all a complete success story with the X6, however. It seems BMW got a bit greedy by trying to up the X6’s insanity level by just a little too much as they added hybrid technology to make it… not that efficient. Seriously, the X6 ActiveHybrid isn’t significantly better in city driving efficiency than the regular X6, which makes it even more pointless. I actually had the chance to review the X6 ActiveHybrid and concluded that X6 ActiveHyrbid owners should just go buy a Mini Cooper S… which makes no sense either. Perhaps the X6’s crazyness is contageous.
Anyway, that crazyness has apparently met its limit because BMW has decided to pull the plug on production for the X6 ActiveHybrid. BMW just isn’t selling any at all. Considering the fact that the X6 ActiveHyrbid costs only a grand more than an X6 M, that isn’t entirely surprising. If the ActiveHybrid had a much lower MSRP, I could see some potential for sales growth. But it sounds like BMW just wants to forget that the X6 ActiveHybrid even existed in the first place.
This isn’t the first time an automaker tried to make a performance vehicle with efficiency in mind and failed. Honda knows about that all too well (CR-Z anyone?).
Will you miss the X6 ActiveHybrid? If you will, you are due back at Bellevue before 6.
[BimmerFile]
