Thank you to the BMW community for inside information. Thank you to Google and the companies themselves for the publicly available data.
I did a little research and fact-checking. All information available to me confirms the following.
In the early 2000s, the VDO division, which manufactured injectors, signed a delivery contract with BMW for piezo injectors for N43/53/63 series engines.
After some time, VDO was acquired and added to the Continental group.
After a certain point, this division was added to Vitesco (specifically, it was part of what was separated from Continental). This division was called Vitesco Technology Italy.
In the year 2024, this division was taken over by Dumarey, renaming it Dumarey Flowmotion Technologies.
For all these years, the company has been located in Italy, in the province of Pisa.
I have to remark – this division employs around 3000 employees – a fairly solid company.
It goes without saying that only a very small part of it deals with the restoration of piezo injectors.
The most interesting part of this story is that the company, for a long time, has had no connection with its initial owners. Even during the time of injector restoration, the owners have changed (from Vitesco to Dumarey).
All “symptoms” indicate that at this moment the division performs a technological process, but the sales of production (relating to piezo injectors) happen via two channels:
a. Part of the injectors are sold to the BMW concern, which sells them further inside its dealer network;
b. Part of the injectors are sold to Vitesco (obviously, Vitesco has kept a profitable cooperation agreement), which sells them further in retail sales under their own “brand”.
It is interesting that, as a result of these reselling manoeuvres of the company, the contract with BMW is kept – restored injectors (their inscriptions are reprinted – with restoration date/year, with new encoding data) still are decorated with the BMW logotype. Of course, such a logotype also entails strict quality requirements and precise action in case of problems (remember the recall campaigns in 2020).
It is also interesting that the restoration of injectors began when the company was owned by Vitesco, but the sale of the “Vitesco” injectors began immediately after the company’s resale. Obviously, when the company belonged to Vitesco, their decision was: let’s sell injectors only to BMW, it will guarantee the maximum price of these injectors, for us (all) – maximum profit. Instead, when the company was sold, the profit now goes to the new owner, Vitesco continues to earn (yes, not as much as previously, but still, but now investing zero in production or technologies, rebranding the production), now manufactured by Dumarey. Aren’t the company’s sales and cooperation agreements perfectly concluded?
And now we have reached the most interesting part – are the Vitesco injectors the same as the ones sold to BMW? Yes, and yet – no.
Under the pitiful-looking Vitesco stickers, we see that those are restored (now by Dumarey) injectors. As if “the same”. I do claim – from the business perspective, there is not even one circumstance that would force or encourage the sale of “identical” injectors, but there are several circumstances that motivate us to diversify this production. What are these arguments/circumstances?
a. everybody (both car manufacturers and customers) knows that the production, delivered by the car manufacturers, is of the highest quality. It is not logical to offer exactly the same quality (which includes very regular and expensive quality/parameter control, replacement in case of problems, recall campaigns in case of more serious quality issues, etc.) for a lower price in the aftermarket.
b. In this business model, the injector “manufacturer” Vitesco actually is only a repacker; Dumarey Flowmotions does not take any reputation risks, connected with the production quality. In addition, these piezo injectors are intended for old (long since discontinued) engines. Old engines (with hundreds of thousands of miles) mean technical problems even in the case of ideal injectors; this is no longer a topic “the engine is in perfect condition, one injector failed – it was replaced, and now everything works perfectly again”. There are and will be problems after replacing the injectors; it makes no sense to offer the highest class product “at all prices”. Here you have to “push” on lower- or more affordable-priced products or normal quality.
c. when manufacturing the injectors, “leftovers” are inevitable. There are injectors that fail QC. There are injectors that were sent back by BMW (installed by their engineers), but for some reason, the outcome was not positive. Exactly such injectors are a perfect production to send to Vitesco for reselling as a budget alternative for BMW injectors.
d. financial argument. In this business model, the injectors “rebranded” by Vitesco have at least 2 additional intermediaries. There is Vitesco itself, which labels the injectors, ensures all logistics, and must invest its own funds (without any illusions – Dumarey receives money for their production “faster” than Vitesco receives money from customers, and this money still “gets stuck” in the pockets of resellers). There are resellers to whom Vitesco delivers the injectors. Also, these resellers have to invest their funds – ensure the delivery service, storage, and “fight” (certain losses) regarding cases of reclamation. As a result, “feeding” these two additional intermediaries, the final price of the injectors should be significantly lower than the price of injectors sold to BMW (even including at least 2 .. 3 levels of discounts). It is not possible if the production of the same (or higher) quality is sold.
The quality of Vitesco injectors is unpredictable. There are cases when they perform correctly (with this, we understand – all injector adaptation and live data are correct, far from redline), but there are cases when the injectors are leaking, or their atomization data are bad, or the flowrate data are completely inappropriate. A lot of different problems with these Vitesco injectors are seen. There is nothing strange either. If you get an injector that has not passed QC by some parameter, the result can be acceptable. If you get an injector that has been received back from BMW (and has been installed on the car, in which inappropriate fuel/fuel additives have been added, or someone has “tested” the injectors on the stand), the result can be harsh. Yes, not taking into account the very high request for these injectors, most of the Vitesco injectors are “older” (restored half a year/year ago, or even more), which could be explained by previously mentioned returns from BMW. Maybe someone gets lucky to buy injector intended for BMW (because the manufacturer’s warehouse at that moment does not have “spare” defective injectors), then life is good.
In my opinion, the most important thing that has to be understood is that each thing costs what it does for a reason. The quality is expensive. It is very naive to think that some patron will sell exactly the same thing, just 2 .. 3 times cheaper, allowing to earn for at least two intermediaries and even in the result – saving our (end user) money! Such Christmas miracles, unfortunately, do not exist.
