Audi History

The name Audi was created because the company's founder was unable to use his own family name. He had previously been forced out of a manufacturing company he had founded using the Horch name, and the old Horch brand sued him for attempting to use his name again for a new company. Horch conferred with his friends Franz and Paul Fikentscher about what his new company should be named. Franz's son, who happened to overhear the conversation, suggested that the name Audi be used since it was a Latin word with the same meaning as the German Horch. Both mean "hear". The first Audi car was produced in 1910.

Audi was the first manufacturer in Germany to produce a left hand drive vehicle, the Type K, which it created in 1921. During the 1920s, left hand drive was becoming popular as it was considered to be safer as it enabled the driver to get a better view of approaching traffic. Majority shares in Audiwerke AG were acquired by Jorgen Rasmussen in 1928, who also purchased the US manufacturer Rickenbacker in the same year. This enabled the use of eight cylinder Rickenbacker engines in the Audi Dresden and Zwickau, which were produced in 1929.

In 1932, Audi merged with the manufacturers Wanderer, DKW and Horch to create Auto Union. The Audi Front, the first European car to have both front wheel drive and a six cylinder engine, was created at this time. The familiar Audi logo was also created. Formed of four rings, it represented the four manufacturers which had combined as Auto Union. Initially, the badge only appeared on the race cars, with each manufacturer continuing to brand their own cars. The sharing of technology between the Auto Union factors was very beneficial, but as the decade progressed, Auto Union began to focus on producing smaller cars that were more suited to the economic times. This meant that Audi played only a minor role in the Auto Union.

The Auto Union factories were taken over for military production during the Second World War. They were damaged by bombing, and dismantled after the war on the orders of the Soviet military. Auto Union was liquidated. The Audi plant became the People Owned Enterprise (or VEB) Automobilwerk Zwickau. Production of pre-war vehicles at Zwickau began again in 1949. The cars were renamed as the IFA F8 and F9, but the East German versions were very similar to the West German ones.

A new Auto Union was established in Ingolstadt in 1949, although it had to use a rented plant in Dusseldorf until funding was made available for construction of an Ingolstadt plant in 1959. By 1959, the Auto Union had been taken over by Daimler-Benz. During the 1960s, the small Auto Union cars did not receive as much interest as the new Mercedes cars, and they were unable to compete with the success of other manufacturers like Opel and Volkswagen. Auto Union was sold again. At the time of its sale, a new factory had just been completed for the production of the larger four stroke engines which would prove to be Auto Union's salvation.

Volkswagen bought Auto Union and the new Ingolstadt factory, which it used to increase production of Volkswagen Beetles. In 1965, the DKW F102 was created with a four stroke engine. However, the DKW brand was associated with two stroke engines, so Volkswagen resurrected the Audi name. The car, which became known as the F103 internally, was sold as the Audi. The model developed into a range of Audi cars, the 60, 75, 80 and the Super 80, which were sold up until 1972.

Auto Union merged with NSU in 1969, to create Audi NSU Auto Union AG. Audi became known as a separate brand, and was introduced to the US in 1970. New models included the Audi 100, Audi 80/Fox, and the Audi 50, which later became the Volkswagen Polo. At this time, Audi had a very conservative image. The Audi Quattro was developed, in 1980, by Jorg Bensinger to counteract this image. It was an all wheel drive vehicle that proved a great success as a performance and rally car, helping to link the Audi name with technological advances.

The company name was changed to Audi AG in 1985, as the NSU and Auto Union brands were no longer important. The type 89 was created, in 1986, but its modern exterior hid a low performance engine and most of its features, including the passenger wing mirror, were considered option extras which had to be paid for. The Audi 90 was released in 1987, with a much better range of basic features.

Audi experienced problems with the Audi 5000 between 1982 and 1987, having to recall cars due to unintended acceleration causing 700 accidents. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration determined that most cases of unintended acceleration were due to driver error, but not before the television program 60 Minutes had engineered footage of an Audi car experiencing sudden unintended acceleration. Audi made modifications to the accelerator and brake pedals in order to reduce the chances of driver error causing an accident. Nevertheless, sales of Audi vehicles dropped. The 5000 models were renamed as the 100 and 200, and warranty protection was increased. By 2000, sales had returned to normal.