Audi’s new models on the way

A7 Sportback is due next month and A6 will debut at AIMS in Melbourne

Audi MD Uwe Hagen revealed to the local media this week that the prestige brand is anticipating some important new models over the next 12 months or so.

The first to roll out is the A7 Sportback (pictured), which is scheduled for a local launch around mid-March. That will be followed by the new A6, which is definitely to be unveiled to the public at the Australian International Motor Show in July.

AIMS will be an important medium for exposing the importer’s new product to the public, Hagen told the Carsales Network.

“[AIMS] is a form of showing that we think this market is really important for us, and using those display possibilities — so we launched the R8 Spyder and the RS5 [in Sydney last year]…

Audi therefore remains committed to AIMS for the foreseeable future, according to Hagen, but principally for the local market. There’s little to no prospect of global debuts at the Aussie shows.

“We’re too small [a market] for a global premiere,” Hagen explained, adding that despite Australia being one of Audi’s strongest markets anywhere in the world, it can’t compare with China. Sales in the fast-growing Asian market will outstrip Audi sales in its domestic market, Germany, next year.

Hagen also explained that the delay between a car’s global launch and its arrival in Australia was typically three to four months. Apparently that delay can be attributable to Australia’s ‘hot climate’ status. Audi builds Australian-delivered cars to a higher specification for our tough environment, using glues and plastics better placed to handle the sunlight and heat. It’s the development of this specification that inevitably holds up the release of a new model in Australia.

Based on this, the company’s Q3 model, which was rumoured to be scheduled for a global launch late this year — or sometime in 2012, Hagen suggested — would be unlikely to reach Australia before the end of the first quarter next year. Also, with Hagen declaring Audi a supporter of AIMS in this country, the Sydney event next year would be a strong prospect for the tiny SUV’s local launch.