Before the Audi Grandsphere Concept moving forward, it had everything to be one of those days that are often nightmarish for car designers.
The subject was the succession of the Audi A8 and Marc Lichte, Audi's design director, was to present his ideas to the management of the Volkswagen Group.
Often in these types of situations, the designers' creativity is clouded by the pressure of having to create something that is accepted. Comments such as “too expensive”, “technically unfeasible” or simply “not meeting the customer's taste” are common in reaction to the proposals presented.
Oliver Hoffmann (left), member of the technical development management board, and Marc Lichte (right), Audi design director
But this time everything went much better. Volkswagen Group Executive Director Herbert Diess was perennial with Marc Lichte when he told him: "Audi has always been successful when designers were brave", thus giving him a safe-conduct so that the project had wheels to walk, opening new paths for the brand of rings.
A similar reaction, too, from Markus Duesmann, the president of Audi, who couldn't be happy with what he saw.
Anticipating the A8 of 2024
The result is this Audi Grandsphere Concept , which will be one of the stars of the 2021 Munich Motor Show, offering a very specific vision of the next generation Audi A8, but also the tangible realization of the Artemis project.
Marc Lichte is very happy with the speed with which his team managed to produce the vehicle that is 75-80% representative of the final production model and that starts by creating a strong visual impact due to its enormous length of 5.35 m. wheelbase of 3.19 m.
Audi's future flagship, which is expected to usher in an era in Audi's styling language in the 2024/25 transition, breaks with many conventions. First, the Grandsphere visually deceives the viewer: when viewed from the rear it appears to have a relatively normal hood, but when we move forward to the front we notice that there isn't much left of the hood, which was once a status symbol for powerful engines.
“The hood is really very small… the smallest I've ever designed on a car”, assures Lichte. The same applies to the elegant silhouette of this concept, which looks more like a GT than a classic sedan, whose days are probably over. But even here the impression is misleading because if we want to catalog the Audi Grandsphere we must consider that it is more like a van than a sedan when it comes to the offer of interior space.
Tricks such as the huge side windows that suddenly drift inwards, connecting to the roof, and the impressive rear spoiler end up translating into important aerodynamic benefits, which then have positive implications for the car's autonomy, which also thanks to the 120 kWh battery , must be greater than 750 km.
Audi engineers are working on 800 V technology for the charging (which is already used in the Audi e-tron GT as well as in the Porsche Taycan from which it derives), but a lot of water will still flow through the neighboring Danube by the end of 2024.
750 km of autonomy, 721 hp…
The Audi Grandsphere won't lack power either, coming from two electric motors with a total of 721 hp and a torque of 930 Nm, which help explain the top speed of more than 200 km/h.
This is pure sovereignty of driving dynamics, but of the “old world”, because the “new world” will focus more of its rhetoric on autonomous driving technologies.
The Grandsphere is expected to be a level 4 “robot car” (in the autonomous driving levels, level 5 is for purely autonomous vehicles that do not require the driver entirely), shortly after its presentation as a final model, in the second half of the decade . It's an ambitious plan, considering that Audi had to give up on tier 3 on the current A8, more because of the lack of regulations or their vagueness, than the system's capabilities itself.
From Business Class to First Class
Space is the new luxury, a reality well-known to Lichte: “We are transforming overall comfort, taking it from Business Class standards to the second row of First Class seats, even in the left front seat, which is what constitutes an authentic revolution”.
If that is what the occupant wants, the seatback can be tilted back 60° and tests on these seats have shown that it is actually possible to sleep through the night, like on board an airplane, on a highway trip (from 750 km) from Munich to Hamburg. Something that is facilitated by the fact that the steering wheel and pedals are retracted, which makes this whole area more unobstructed.
The narrow, curved instrument panel, adorned by a full-width continuous digital display, also contributes to the great sense of space. In this concept car, the screens are designed in wooden applications, but it is not certain that this ingenious solution will materialize: “We are still working on its implementation”, admits Lichte.
In the first phase, the Audi Grandsphere will be equipped with more conventional screens, the screens being able to be used not only to pass information on speed or remaining autonomy, but also for entertainment with video games, movies or television programs. In order to implement this infotainment system, Audi is establishing partnerships with high-tech giants like Apple, Google and streaming services like Netflix.
This is how a show of courage in the form of a car is prepared.
Authors: Joaquim Oliveira/Press-Inform