Will it be a Mini-badged Great Wall? Details of the Mini Aceman's new electric car platform finally revealed

More details have been revealed about the underpinnings of Mini’s first dedicated electric vehicle, the Aceman small SUV.

Revealed in concept form in Germany this week, the production Aceman will eventually roll out to global markets in 2024.

Mini didn’t confirm any details about the all-electric powertrain of the production Aceman at the event, but we can reveal the platform that will underpin the new model.

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There had been speculation that the Aceman - which will be built in China under a joint-venture agreement with new Chinese partner Great Wall Motor - would be underpinned by an existing BMW Group platform.

The most likely contender was the FAAR platform that will form the basis of the upcoming third-gen BMW X1 and electric iX1 small SUV.

However, the head of the Mini brand, Stefanie Wurst, confirmed to Australian media at the concept reveal that the production version of the Aceman will be built using “a cooperation platform between Great Wall and BMW”.

Ms Wurst went on to confirm that it would be a dedicated battery electric vehicle platform, and that it will be exclusively used by BMW Group.

That means Great Wall will not have access to the architecture and therefore there will be no Great Wall-badged models spun off the platform.

The new Mini Aceman EV win't use the same platform as the GWM Ora Cat.

Great Wall has two EV platforms, the Me and the awkwardly named LEMON, the latter of which forms the basis of the Ora Cat model that is expected to be offered in Australia.

One Mini executive explained that while most carmakers use one electric architecture for multiple models with different body styles and designs, Mini would be unifying its design for its next-generation products, but using more than one platform.

This means there will be little to no mechanical relationship between the Aceman and Mini’s upcoming new-generation family of models.

Ms Wurst added that if you line up the next-gen Mini three-door Hatch in EV and internal combustion guise next to each other, “you won't be able to tell the difference, because they are like twins, but they have a different base”.

As well as BMW Group’s tie-in with Great Wall, the company has a long-standing partnership with Chinese domestic manufacturer, Brilliance Automotive that has just been extended to 2040.

The sole EV in Mini’s current model range is the three-door ‘Electric’ hatch which is built using the BMW Group’s UKL platform - the same one used for the petrol models. FAAR is an evolution of this and, like BMW’s large car CLAR architecture, will have the capability to be paired with internal combustion, hybrid, plug-in hybrid and fully electric powertrains.

The next-gen Hatch and Countryman are expected to use the FAAR platform.

Many other premium brands use internal combustion engine architecture for their respective small EVs. Rival Mercedes-Benz uses the same MFA2 platform for its EQA that underpins the GLA, while the electric Lexus UX300e shares its architecture with the petrol and hybrid powered versions of the UX.