Bentley Motors is celebrating production of the last hand-built, high performance 12-cylinder engine at the company’s UK headquarters in Crewe. It concludes a pivotal chapter in Bentley’s history, as the last W12-powered Bentayga, Continental GT and Flying Spur cars roll off the production line at the company’s Dream Factory.

More than 100 000 W12s have been produced since the engine was introduced in the original Continental GT in 2003. The milestone decision to cease production is in line with Bentley’s ground-breaking Beyond100 strategy, which will see the company become a global leader in sustainable luxury mobility.

Andreas Lehe, member of the board for manufacturing at Bentley Motors, said: “The W12 has played such an important role in the history of Bentley.”

“The engine’s introduction helped change the face of the company almost overnight and so will go down in history as a true game changer and we should feel very proud to have designed, developed and manufactured such an icon in Britain for such a long period of time.”

The 6.0-litre twin-turbo W12 – the most successful 12-cylinder engine of the modern era – will be replaced with an all-new, performance-focused powertrain to mark the start of a new era for the company. That Ultra High Performance Hybrid will combine a powerful V8 combustion engine with advanced battery technology. ‘Electrocharging’ uses a potent hybrid system and builds further on Bentley’s existing petrol-electric powertrains.

Every model in the Bentley range will become available with the new electrified powertrain. The unit develops even more power than the retiring W12, combined with a lowly WLTP drive cycle CO2 figure of just 50g/km.