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Audi builds its six-millionth Quattro-equipped car

All-wheel drive has become the norm particularly among German automakers. Mercedes offers its 4Matic system on a broad range of models, BMW counters with its xDrive system, Volkswagen has 4Motion, and the only Porsche you actually can't get with all-wheel traction is the Boxster/Cayman. But before all its competitors got on board with channeling power to all four wheels, Audi was making a name for itself with its Quattro all-wheel-drive system.
Now 34 years since the advent of the original Audi Quattro, the House of the Four Rings has built its six millionth vehicle equipped with all-wheel drive - only a year and a half since it hit the five-million mark. In fact these days nearly half of all new Audis are ordered in Quattro spec - more than any other automaker - resulting in a total of 710,095 Quattro-equipped Audis produced last year alone.
The landmark 6,000,000th vehicle was an SQ5 in monsoon gray metallic that rolled off the assembly line on Friday and is bound for a customer right here in the United States.

Audi designs science fiction car for Ender's Game movie [w/video]

Audi is no stranger to product placement in movies, but the upcoming sci-fi adventure movie, Ender's Game, will be the first time the German automaker has ever unveiled a "purely virtual" vehicle design in a movie. As the movie's star car, the futuristic Audi fleet shuttle quattro was created by Audi Design as a "vision for the future world."
This new movie car comes almost 10 years after one of our favorite Audi movie cars ever, the Audi RSQ that was prominently used in the 2004 sci-fi action film, I, Robot. Looking back, the RSQ obviously used cues from the Audi R8, but it's unclear if the fleet shuttle quattro has any design implications for future Audi production models.
The movie, based on the best-selling novel of the same name, stars Harrison Ford and Asa Butterfield, and it premiers in the US on November 1. Audi has provided images of the fleet shuttle quattro, and Summit Entertainment has released its latest trailer for the movie, which is posted below along with an Audi press release.

Audi to abandon CVTs?

The continuously variable transmission is one of those technologies that seems to make a lot of sense on paper, but in reality, almost always numbs the driving experience. That's one reason why Audi, according to reports, is planning to phase them out.
One of the first automakers to implement use of the CVT, Audi mates CVTs to larger engines than many other manufacturers, which typically install them on scooters, hybrids and small-displacement hatchbacks. But the time of the Audi CVT (which it calls Multimatic) may be near its end as a report from Australia indicates that Ingolstadt is moving toward a two-gearbox lineup that does not include the rubber-band transmission.
Instead, Audi is said to be focusing its attention on the S-tronic dual-clutch transmission and on conventional torque-converter automatics - although the development of beefier DCTs could spell the end of the Audi slushbox, as well. We've reached out to Audi for comment, so watch this space for confirmation.