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Audi investing $30.3 billion through 2018 for product expansion

How does Audi plan to reach two million units in annual sales and pay for the 11 new models it's adding to its lineup - an expansion that may include models named SQ2, Q9 and F-Tron? By increasing its investment to 22 billion euros ($30.3 billion US) between now and 2018. That figure represents an increase of about 500 million euros over the previously planned outlay, according to a report by Automotive News, and that could be due to Audi wishing to goad the momentum that pushed it to 1.5 million annual sales two years ahead of schedule.
It's also about staving off the challenges from BMW and Mercedes-Benz. Now that BMW has been able to turn some of its attention away from its "i" series of Megacity cars, it will reportedly spend more than planned in 2014 as it continues the rollout of ten all-new vehicles and 15 new-generation vehicles through the end of next year. Mercedes, having been dropped to third in the sales race, is preparing to add 13 new cars over the next six years.
Audi's money is going into technology, into product like the next-generation TT and the Q1 and production expansions and upgrades all over the world. The expenditure represents just under a fourth of Volkswagen's 84.2 billion-euro ($115.7 US) outlay devoted to taking the number-one global automaker title away from General Motors and Toyota by 2018.

VW stops diesel sales in Europe

You can't buy a 2016 VW TDI with "cheater software" in the US right now, since the German automaker needs to revamp its diesel cars to legitimately pass emissions tests. That could take months. Sales of affected new VW diesels throughout Europe have now been put on hold as well. Exactly how many cars are affected is unclear, but Reuters says it is a "limited number." In the US, roughly 20 percent of the cars VW sold this year were diesels (until last month, when the diesel share dropped to 11.7 percent. Expect a further drop in October's numbers). In Europe, though, diesels make up about half of the overall vehicle fleet, so stopping sales there will have a much bigger impact. The good news for VW and its related brands is that the only diesels that will no longer be sold are the ones on dealer lots that use the EA 189/Euro 5 engine. The bad news is that that engine is used in a lot of VW products, mostly small and midsize cars. This includes popular vehicles like the Audi A3 and the VW Golf. Larger diesel vehicles use engines that reduce emissions using a urea solution called AdBlue. The smaller EA 189 engine was not built with an AdBlue process, and instead used software to make it seem like the cars were cleaner than they really were. Reuters says the currently not-for-sale vehicles with the EA 189 powerplant will be "upgraded" and then - hopefully - sold. A description of this fix should be made in Europe in November.

Autoblog Podcast #406

Episode #406 of the Autoblog Podcast is here, and this week, Dan Roth, Brandon Turkus, and Chris Bruce talk about the Mustang Shelby GT 350, the Los Angeles Auto Show, and the Volkswagen Golf winning Motor Trend Car of the Year honors. We start with what's in the Autoblog Garage and finish up with some of your questions, and for those of you who hung with us live on our UStream channel, thanks for taking the time. Check out the rundown below with times for topics, and you can follow along down below with our Q&A. Thanks for listening! Autoblog Podcast #406: The video meant to be presented here is no longer available. Sorry for the inconvenience. Topics: Ford Shelby GT350 LA Auto Show Volkswagen Golf wins Motor Trend COTY In The Autoblog Garage: 2015 Ford Fiesta SFE 2015 Honda CR-V 2015 Audi Q3 Hosts: Dan Roth, Brandon Turkus, Chris Bruce Runtime: 01:26:07 Rundown: Intro and Garage - 00:00 Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 - 29:21 LA Auto Show - 40:36 Golf is Motor Trend COTY - 53:50 Q&A - 01:00:42 Get the podcast: [UStream] Listen live on Mondays at 10 PM Eastern at UStream [iTunes] Subscribe to the Autoblog Podcast in iTunes [RSS] Add the Autoblog Podcast feed to your RSS aggregator [MP3] Download the MP3 directly Feedback: Email: Podcast at Autoblog dot com Review the show in iTunes