THE global revolution in IT-led design, engineering and manufacturing technology has transformed the automotive industry.

With product design and development times slashed, plus flexibility of production plants and equipment undreamed of by earlier generations of designers and engineers, equalling a proliferation of new models, variants and even whole new market niches on an unprecedented scale.

With more than four times the number of cars and variants now in the global marketplace compared with the 1990s, buyers of all types  – not least SME business users – face daunting complexity in  trying to hack  their way through to the correct model choices.

A great deal too much complexity in fact, says BMW’s Matt Bristow, who replaced the promoted Steve Chater as BMW GB’s  corporate operations manager (business sales chief) at the start of this year.