By Ju-min Park
April 14, 20264:57 PM GMT+5:30Updated 22 hours ago
Item 1 of 2 The company logo is seen at the headquarters of the German car manufacturer Audi in Ingolstadt, Germany, June 3, 2020. REUTERS/Andreas Gebert
[1/2]The company logo is seen at the headquarters of the German car manufacturer Audi in Ingolstadt, Germany, June 3, 2020. REUTERS/Andreas Gebert Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
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BEIJING, April 14 (Reuters) – Trying to regain market share in China, Germany’s Audi will launch a third model next year under its new Chinese brand in collaboration with local partner SAIC Motor Corp, the chief executive of the project said on Tuesday.
In 2024, Audi launched a new electric vehicle brand in China whose cars sport just the name AUDI and not its signature four-ring logo, part of its efforts to woo younger customers in the world’s largest car market.
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Since September, the automaker has sold a total of 10,000 units of the E5 Sportback, the first model of Audi’s series of electric vehicles (EVs) jointly developed with SAIC, said Fermín Soneira, CEO of the Audi and SAIC Cooperation Project.
He added that E5 sales rebounded to 2,630 units in March after falling sales in January and February due to fading tax effects.
The premium marque, owned by Germany’s Volkswagen (VOWG.DE), opens new tab, will launch the fully electric SUV E7X, its second China-only model without the four-ring logo, to market in the second quarter of this year.
The next one in line for 2027 will be a limousine, but a sporty model for the high-end market, Soneira told a group of foreign journalists in Beijing.
“The third car is already in the pipeline,” Soneira said.
Soneira said the development process in Audi’s new China line-up takes two years, which is 30 % to 40 % faster than in Europe, because these cars are developed and designed only for China.
“That means fulfilling, fully concentrating on Chinese requirements and I talk about customer requirements. I talk also about legal requirements,” he said.
