what does the name "Audi" mean????

[Steve Sears]

Chris,
The name's origins date back to the early days of the automobile.  August
Horch was running a fairly successful car company building luxury vehicles.
IIRC, he and his financial partners had a falling out (circa-1909), and he
sold the company to them.  Following the buyout, the partners proceeded to
register trademarks in various versions of the Horch name to keep customers
from following the coachbuilder into his new business.  In Audi lore, Horch
and his new partners were hunkered down one evening at his house trying to
produce a name for their new car company.  "Horch" can be translated in
German as "Hark!".  When they were trying out names, Horch's son, who was
working on his latin homework at the time, asked why not use
"Audi".....there was a phrase, he used ....something like "In
felicitas..[somethingsomething]....Audi" (I never took Latin) - which
translates as "Listen!" and the name stuck.  I believe if you look on the
web - whether on the Audi Tradition web site:
http://www.audi.com/de/de/unternehmen/historie/historie.jsp (use Altavista
to translate)
or even in your copy of A Tradition of Excellence (you don't have one?????)
you'll find info on this.
The early Audi logo was a music note (obviously to reinforce the
connection).  In 1932 the companies of Audi, DKW, Horch and Wanderer were
merged by the government to form the "Auto Union" (hence the 4 rings).  Auto
Union produced the Audi Front (first successfully mass-produced fwd car) in
1933.  Auto Union's factories were in the east following the war, and it
took a few years until they began to produce vehicles again (the first ones
were 2 cylinder 2 strokes) - BTW, the prewar AU Factory in Zwickau became
the new IFA factory - IFA being the evential producer of the Trabant.
Daimler Benz acquired Auto Union in 1958, selling 2 stroke cars/trucks and
motorcycles under the DKW and Auto Union names, following which AU was sold
to VW in 1965 and the DKW F-102 had a Mercedes 4-stroke engine installed and
was released as "The Audi".
BTW, there has been a rumour in the AU/DKW newsgroup about VW reviving the
Auto Union name as the umbrella company under which
VW/Audi/Porsche/Seat/Skoda/Lamborghini/etc. operate - maybe as a lesson
learned from trying to sell VW Phaeton$.
Cheers!
Steve Sears - DKW Club of America newsletter editor and
Chairman-in-the-wings
1987 Audi 5kTQ
1980 Audi 5k
1962 and '64 Auto Union DKW Junior deLuxes - now don't ask what DKW stood
for......
(SPAM Blocker NOTE: Remove SHOES to reply)

----- Original Message ----- 
> From: JordanVw at aol.com
> Subject: what does the name "Audi" mean????
> To: quattro at audifans.com
> Message-ID: <15b.46f91203.2efc66ab at aol.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
>
> what are the orgins of the name "Audi"?
>
> iirc, "Audi" is latin for "listen"??
>
> also was Auto Union comprised of Horch, Wanderer, NSU, and DKW??
>
> When did Auto Union become "Audi"?
>
> thanks
>
> chris