2014 Audi A7 3.0t Premium Plus Quattro on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Witness the Prologue to Audi's design future [w/videos]

Audi went Hollywood for its debut of the forward-looking Prologue concept car last night, pulling the silks back at a sprawling LA manse in the hills. The cost-no-object unveiling of the car, as well as its prominent positioning at this year's LA Auto Show, speaks to the importance with which the company views the styling you see here.
Prof. Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg, maharishi of development for the three-rings brand, made two important announcements at the presentation: reiterating publicly his endorsement of new styling chief Marc Lichte, and telling us that Prologue design will be found on upcoming production versions of the A6, A7 and A8.
Take a close look at that imposing face on the Prologue - an amped up revision of the single-frame shield grille that has appeared on new models like the TT already - and get used to it. Lichte called out the grille as the new face of the brand, so we fully expect its deployment across the range as the 2016 models roll out.

2015 Audi S3 Sedan

For the last few years, Audi has been publicly toying with building a successor to its Ur-Quattro, a model still glowing in a gritty patina of motorsports glory decades after it left the scene. If anything, the rally car's halo has burned brighter as Audi has matured into a world luxury superpower. Since 2010, the German automaker has shown two different concept cars that attempted to re-bottle the legend's lightning, and it's still trying to figure out whether to market a production model. Despite that conundrum (and not to take anything away from the seminal Ur-Quattro), it's easy to argue that there are two other cars much more important to Audi's rise from its '80s ashes: the original TT and the B5-generation A4 and its high-performance variants.
The TT thrust Audi into the vanguard of automotive styling while firmly establishing the Volkswagen Group as masters of platform development (the same basic architecture and powertrain guts were employed in a dizzying array of models, from the Golf, Jetta and New Beetle to a number of Škoda products). This unprecedented, flexible building-block approach to new model development has since become the standard of the industry.
In the case of its B5 cars, the A4, S4 and RS4 put Audi back on the radar of rival German automakers, and more importantly, they grew the Four Rings' sales by leaps and bounds while reminding the world that all-wheel drive needn't only benefit hardcore performance cars and utility vehicles. Fast-forward to today, and the A4 has established itself as the bedrock of Audi's lineup, but it's also grown over its four generations to become substantially larger, heavier and costlier than the model that debuted back in 1996 America. That's created a vacuum at the bottom of the range that the company has inadequately addressed - until now.

2015 Audi A3 Sportback E-Tron

A little more than a year ago, I drove an Audi A3 E-Tron prototype - an early concept electric vehicle built on the outgoing second-generation A3 platform. While I was impressed with the technology, its 3,800-pound weight, 10-second 0-60 time and 90-mile range will likely put it only mid-pack, at best, among its future competitive set. But Audi promised bigger and better things would come.
I didn't have to wait long. Immediately following the Los Angeles Auto Show, Audi asked me come drive its all-new successor built on the company's third-generation A3 chassis. Compared to last year's model, the new plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) boasts a lighter curb weight, quicker acceleration and six times the range. Calling it improved is an understatement. Best of all, it's heading to production.
Technically speaking, the 2015 Audi A3 Sportback E-Tron is a parallel hybrid, meaning its electric motor is sandwiched between a combustion engine and an automatic transmission - either, or both, is capable of powering the front wheels. The gasoline-powered engine is a direct-injected and turbocharged 1.4-liter four-cylinder, rated at 150 horsepower. The transmission is a six-speed dual-clutch gearbox. A 75-kW electric motor sits between the two. Water is used to cool the gasoline engine, the electric motor and the battery pack - there are three independent closed loops.