The BMW 507 is one of the brand's most sought after vehicles — after all, even Elvis drove one. The svelte roadster was in production for just three years from 1956 to 1959, and with a high price tag of $10,500 USD (equivalent to just under $100,00 USD today), BMW struggled to sell very many examples of the car.
That poor commercial success is what makes the 507 so desirable today, though. With just 252 constructed, a 507 can easily fetch $2.5 million USD at collector car auctions, making it one of the most valuable BMWs of all time. A 507 owned by legendary racer John Surtees even sold for $5 million USD at auction last summer.
BMW may now be interested in reviving the legendary 507 nameplate, with autoTRADER.ca digging up a trademark application for "507" that was filed by the German automaker with the World Intellectual Property Organization. The company filed for this trademark on November 7th, 2019 under two separate product classifications - one for vehicles and another for sporting equipment, toys, games and the like.
The German brand also filed to reserve the 507 name in its home market of Germany back in June of this year. While the WIPO filing is still pending approval, the German filing has been given the green light and is currently active. It's hard to say if BMW does intend on using the name on a new vehicle, but with the BMW i8 and i8 Roadster set to go out of production in 2020, we wouldn't be shocked if it had another hybrid or electric sportscar in the pipeline to replace it.
BMW also recently filed to reserve several different "i" nameplates - including i330, i340, i350, i420, i430 and i450, among others. BMW's electric car sub-brand is called "i" and all of its future EVs and plug-ins will use the "i" prefix, so these filings could give us a glimpse into the future of the "i" brand. We also know that BMW has a fully electric version of the 3 Series on the way, so it would make sense if it were to introduce a fully electric 4 Series eventually, as well. Using names like these would also be a bit confusing for customers, however, as BMW also uses "i" as a suffix on its internal combustion engine models - like the 330i, for example.
It's worth noting that BMW may have no plans to release a production or concept car that uses the 507 name, or any of the "i" names, and simply wants to prevent another automaker from coming along and stealing them. We'll have to wait and see what BMW has in store for its sports car and EV buyers, we suppose.
You may also like
