By the mid 1990s, Ferdinand Piech had bounced his way from being the chief at Audi to his position as the boss of the truly giant VW Group. His technical genius saw him hatching a plan to build numerous VWs, Audis, Seats and Skodas the four brands in the company portfolio, using the maximum number [...]

Fourteen years after the Quattro, Audi’s technological onslaught resumed with the all aluminum A8 limousine. Because aluminum is less stiff than steel pressing a conventionally engineered body out of aluminum would have proved difficult, if not impossible. With the type of lateral thinking that has come to typify Audi’s approach, the company developed a whole [...]

Nothing has ever demonstrated the inherent strength of Audi’s remarkable engineering better than the Porsche developed RS2 estate. It is one of those cars that grandly epitomize everything that is the best in its maker. Audi had already carried through the logic Quattro driven, turbocharged S-series and developed the S2 estate. This was an exceptionally [...]

Audi’s growing reputation for technical innovation took a back seat with the launch, in 1986, of the Audi 80 and 90. The company decided to focus on how it was pushing back the frontiers of modern styling, build quality and safety, instead of concentrating on its already established reputation for being the world leader when [...]

There aren’t many true landmark vehicles in the history of the car, but the Audi Quattro has a strong claim to be one of them. It introduced four wheel drive to road cars, and provided a way of harnessing very high levels of power to make high performance driving in all weathers and on all [...]

Ferdinand Piech, Audi’s chief engineer (and a member of a Porsche owning family), was firmly of the view in the late 1970’s that the way forward for the Audi was an emphasis on new technology. It was this vision that helped create such cars for the firm as the 100 CD, and fuelled the Audi’s [...]