Audi thinks it may have gotten a little ahead of itself.
The German marque is the latest to turn its focus to building out a more robust lineup of hybrid models, according to Autocar. The brand still intends to go all-electric, it’s just not in the rush it once was.
Audi remains committed to EVs, even if the transition hasn’t gone as smoothly as initially hoped. Because of the latter, the company’s CEO Gernot Döllner recently talked to the press through the company’s plan to future-proof itself for the “extended transition” between combustion and electric vehicles. This will involve releasing vehicles with more efficient ICE powertrains and plenty of new plug-in hybrids.
“Within the Volkswagen Group, we recognized early on that plug-in hybrids were a relevant project technology and now we see that the bridge is longer than we initially thought,” he told reporters.
In preparation for the new hybrid push, Audi has already engineered new combustion engines that will be able to travel up to 62 miles on electric power thanks to larger battery packs. It also recently unveiled the new PPC versatile architecture, which is utilized by the new A5, which will reportedly eventually be able to accommodate range-extending technology.
Despite this, Audi is sticking to its previously announced goal of having a full EV lineup by 2033. Döllner said the company would be a little more cautious moving forward, though, gradually building the lineup out and continuing to offer combustion and hybrid versions of its core models.
“We see right now a slowly negative trend in battery-electric vehicles, but there are still positive growth rates regarding battery-electric vehicles, so it’s just that the growth rates have slowed down,” the executive is quoted as saying. “But we believe, especially with the gradient of the innovation in the battery-electric segment, that the battery-electric vehicle is superior.”
Audi is the latest company we’ve seen pump the brakes and what was probably an overly ambitious electrification timeline. This year alone, some of the biggest luxury automakers, including Mercedes-Benz, Aston Martin, and Bentley, refocus on hybrids. More EVs are coming, of course, it just turns out that the combustion engine has more life in it than previously thought.
