Over the years, there had been various attempts at a Mini replacement. The only one to make the cut was the Metro, but the classic Mini would stay in production until 2000, famously outliving the car initially conceived to be its successor.
After a flurry of activity in the late 1960s and 1970s, little else had happened on the Mini replacement front until 1992, when Rover put together its small-scale Minki 1 concept as a special project. This was a buck based on a regular Mini, but with the Metro Hydragas suspension, a revised driving position, a special dash and a three-cylinder version of the K-Series. However, all developments were scrapped.
From March 1994, when it bought Rover, BMW seemed to have identified the Mini as a priceless brand, and
