UK's Auto Express interviewed Carsten Priest, head of product development for BMW's M division, as to how the brand plans on differentiating the M2 from the M3/M4.
"You don't want to drag people down from an M3 or an M4. That wouldn't be sensible...If you remember the 1 Series M Coupe there's always a bit of overlap, but we offered the manual gearbox only – that was one of the main differences."
There is no word if the M2 will be a limited production model like the 1M coupe. If so, only engineering one transmission for those hard-core buyers would make financial sense as BMW had no trouble finding enough people to snatch up the 1M. However, if the M2 is going to be more of a mainstream offering with a higher production volume both in the US and for Europe, given the market demands for dual-clutch gearboxes it would seem that BMW would offer both. Either way what is for certain is that the M2 will have some major improvements over the M235.
"If you look at what the M235i stands for, it's a lot of driving excitement and emotion for sure, but it doesn't go as far as an M core model. To qualify as an M core model, it would have to go quite a big step further."