Audi held its annual general meeting last week and the company used the event to discuss a handful of future models, its plans to embrace electrification and the latest developments in autonomous driving technology. Starting with the latter, the company revealed it has taken the leading role in developing autonomous driving technology for the Volkswagen Group.
The 2018 Audi A8 is slated to offer Level 3 autonomous driving, but the company is already working on "driverless vehicles" which can be used in urban environments. Audi declined to go into specifics, however it did say the fully-autonomous driving technology will be ready for use in a "small series of cars" by 2021.
Besides talking about autonomous technology, Audi reaffirmed the Q4 and Q8 will be launched in 2019. The four-ringed brand also confirmed plans to launch three battery-electric models by 2020. Audi will then "gradually electrify models in each of its core series." The company has high hopes for these vehicles as it expects fully or partially electric models to make up a third of its sales by 2025.
In the near term, Audi is focused on launching the redesigned A7 and A8. Audi Chairman Rupert Stadler said the latter will "show the world everything that defines Vorsprung durch Technik and our brand."