BMW permitted Alpina to produce a high-performance version of its flagship 7 Series, however they did not want it to be a high-revving, BMW M version (which would have been known as a "BMW M7" under the current nomenclature). It has also been suggested that there was no market for an M7 that would have featured the BMW M's trademark high-rev engine and twin-clutch automated manual transmission, and most customers who desired a performance option in the 7 Series would have gone for the V12-engined BMW 760Li.