Audi Sport Will Introduce Electrification in 2020

Audi Sport is going to be giving electrified performance, starting from 2020. The branch that puts the R in RS will be doing more crossovers too.

Stephan Winkelmann, head of Audi Sport shared the news to Autocar. “From 2020 onwards, the start of the introduction of battery electric vehicles”, said Winkelmann. “This will start by the end of 2020, with the first car of Audi Sport, and then there will be more coming.”

Using electricity to boost performance, the way Porsche’s e-hybrids do, is certainly not a bad thing. Green performance is still performance, and Winkelmann said electrified, not full EV. There’s an important difference if you’re not ready to give up internal combustion engines just yet. As Quattro, Audi Sport spent a great deal on electric R8s, with little production result.

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Winkelmann also hinted that there will be more Audi Sport Q models. “We are also looking into cars which are, let’s say, in a growing segment or a body segment which is growing. These are the Qs. We will get more of them and we think that this is going to help us because every car we are building, and every car we are investing in, should have global visibility, so not just in Europe but in Asia and the Americas.” These won’t be Euro-only like the SQ7, and the idea of an RSQ7 or RSQ5 super SUV is certainly interesting.

Fans of the current lineup need not worry, however. “We are not forgetting our icons, so we will continue to build them. Even if we keep in mind that electrification is important for us, legislators permitting, our turbo engines will stay because we are very proud of these,” Winkelmann said. So RS cars after 2020 might get some electrification, but they’ll continue to get turbocharged gas engines. And hopefully, some of them will keep having five-cylinders.

A version of this story originally appeared on VW Vortex

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