The all-new BMW 7 Series is in India, priced at close to Rs 1 crore!

BMW has launched the fifth-generation 7 Series in India. The car, which is a rival to cars like the Mercedes-Benz S-class and Audi A8, will be available in three variants in India – the 730Ld, 740Li and the 750Li.

The new BMW 750Li will be available in India right away, while the 740Li and 730Ld will go on sale by mid-2009. The 750Li will be priced at Rs 93.30 lakh, ex-showroom, and will be absolutely packed with safety, handling and performance enhancing technologies. For details on most of these technologies, see here

Moving on from the 7 Series, BMW is also looking at various other new launches in India this year, including the new 3 Series sedan, a diesel variant of the X3 SUV and the X6 SUV-sedan crosso...

Recession? For BMW, certainly not!

While the worldwide economic slowdown has brought many carmakers to their knees, that’s certainly not the case with BMW – at least not in India. The German company says it has recorded a 100% growth in the sales of its cars here in 2008. BMW, which had already delivered 2,700 cars in India by the end of November this year, plans to get to the 2,800 figure by the end of this month

Given that BMW had only sold 1,387 cars in India last year, the above figures are certainly commendable. And while the company does expect sales to dip in 2009, it still plans to increase its dealership network, spreading to relatively smaller cities like Ludhiana, Bhubaneshwar, Jaipur and Coimbatore.

BMW’s plant in Chennai has an annual production capacity of 3,000...