There was an article today in one of the main Swedish newspapers where Audis CEO is interviewed on a few topics, including autonomous driving, EV's and Tesla. I've cut out the parts that wasn't about the aforementioned and translated it into English. It's quite interesting, especially the autonomous driving and Audis future plans. Here's a link to the original article (it's in Swedish)
Audis uppvisning i Paris | Motor | SvD
I'm aware that I might be posting it in an inappropriate thread but I figured this is where most people hang out and we're just digesting and talking about last nights event. Feel free to move it mods.
”Audi A8 will be completely autonomous by 2016”
“Audi to have autonomous cars in traffic by 2016”, says the CEO of Audi, Rupert Stadler in a SvD-interview (one of the main Swedish news papers). He also says that Tesla has taken a big risk.
Then he proceeds, in full verbiage, to talk about Audis efforts on electric vehicles.
- The coming years we’ll reduce the Co2 emissions by 10 – 15 % for petrol and diesel cars. But that is not enough to reach the increasingly harder Co2 emission regulations. That’s why we’ve strategically invested heavily on plug in-hybrids.
- With the next generation batteries we’ll have cars that’ll do 400 kilometers (249 miles) on electricity, then we’ll be ready for electric vehicles.
But there is a brand called Tesla which already offers that. What’s your take on that?
Ruperts verbiage lessens.
- Uhm, we’re aware of Tesla, of course. There has been three fires, where Tesla vehicles caught on fire. What do I mean to say by that, well, they took a big risk, a risk which a big player in the auto industry would never take.
Don’t you think Tesla is of enough good quality?
- I can’t judge that. But we have to give 8 years warranty on the batteries and when we give warranty we prove that the warranty works.
Rupert then gives Tesla acknowledgment for bringing a high performance car to the market.
It’s noticeable that the subject of Tesla is sensitive. Tesla came from nowhere into the premium car market with an electric vehicle (albeit heavy) which can be driven more than 400 kilometers (249 miles) on batteries that are basically standardized laptop batteries, and left the competition behind them.
Then we touch on another future aspect.
- We’re much more advanced in autonomous driving technology than many people think. Next generation Audi A8 will be equipped with an option whereby the car drives completely by itself in 2016.
As late as August this year a self driving Audi A7 was tested on a public highway in Florida. It accelerated, steered and was breaking by itself in speeds up to 60 kilometers per hour (37 mph).
Rupert Stadler elaborates his reasoning and says it’s about driving on narrower roads, but even about safety and comfort and he exemplifies with occasions when there are long traffic queues on the highways.
- Then the driver can dedicate himself to working or speaking on the phone but still have a little attention on the road.
