The Chinese market has long had a love affair with long-wheelbase vehicles, and BMW has catered to this perfectly with their 5 and 7-Series cars in the past.
To meet this ever-increasing demand, BMW has unveiled the new 3-Series Li — another long-wheelbase 3-Series that is going to be exclusively sold in China.
Set to debut at the Shanghai Auto Show later this month, BMW's stretched midsized sedan will be built by BMW Brillance Automotive.
While the German manufacturer has remained tight-lipped around the car's specifications, they have confirmed that the “extra wheelbase length goes towards creating class-leading space for the rear passengers.” The Li will feature front and rear comfort seats alongside a standard panoramic glass roof.
The previous 3-Series Li added 110mm onto the standard 3-Series sedan's wheelbase, if the 2020 model is the same, we can expect a total wheelbase of just over 2.9 metres.
Despite not mentioning any dimension specifications, BMW confirmed that it will be powered by a turbocharged four-cylinder engine — we can imagine that it'll be similar to the 190kW engine that powers the current 330i.
The new Li will be presented with the standard 3-Series at the show, but BMW has previously mentioned that the long-wheelbase variant makes up for over 75 per cent of total 3-Series sales in China. 80 per cent of the total 3-Series sales in the world comes from China.
BMW are also expected to debut the X3 M and X4 M that they unveiled beack in February. The two crossovers are both powered by a 3.0-litre twin-turbo six-cylinder engine that propells them from 0-60mph (0-96km/h) in just 4.1 seconds.
