audi eoy report (long)

[Eaton Dave <dave.eaton@minedu.govt.nz>]

		Sales in excess of DM 27 billion; investments soar Record
production figure and employment level Continued growth expected for 1999 

		"Audi has achieved its ambitious targets for 1998", declared
Dr. Franz-Josef Paefgen, Chairman of the Board of Management of AUDI AG, in
an initial review of the past financial year. Group sales rose to over DM 27
billion (1997: DM 22.4 billion). Paefgen continued: "We remain on a course
of growth and are thus building on the progress of recent years. Since 1994,
sales revenues have more than doubled, vehicle sales have increased by
around 60 percent, investments have risen to more than twice the level of
1994, and our total workforce has expanded by over 30 percent." 

		Last year, Audi's vehicle sales reached a total of 599,509
units. This represents an increase worldwide of 9.7 percent. Vehicle sales
in Germany totalled 244,127, an increase of 2.3 percent. Market share in
Germany was 6.5 (6.8) percent, and 3.4 (3.4) percent in Western Europe. 

		Audi achieved particularly high rates of growth in Western
Europe excluding Germany (256,803 Audi cars delivered, increase of 15
percent) and in the USA (47,517 Audi cars delivered, increase of 39.1
percent). Sales in Japan fell by 18 percent to 8,828 in the wake of the
economic crisis in Asia, though Audi's share of the import market there,
which contracted by 22 percent, rose to 3.3 percent (1997; 3.2 percent). In
the rest of the world, vehicle sales rose by 7.1 percent to 42,234 Audis. Of
this total, 7,578 vehicles were sold in China (up 4.5 percent). 

		Production output of vehicles rose by 11 percent in 1998 to
619,030 units. The A4 remained the highest-volume model in 1998, with a
total of 265,414 units manufactured, followed by the A6 on 174,867 and the
A3 on 143,974 units. Production capacity for the A8 was once again utilized
to the full, with 15,355 of this model built. The TT sportscar, which first
appeared on the market at the end of October, reached a production total of
13,682. The number of engines built in Györ and Ingolstadt rose to
1,241,351, an increase of 62.5 percent on 1997. 

		Capital investments in 1998 were over one and a half times
higher than in the previous year: measures to update and extend the product
range accounted around two-thirds of more than DM 3 billion (1997: DM 1.967
billion). 

		The employees total for the Audi Group rose by 10.3 percent
as at the end of the year, to 42,372; the figure for Audi AG (German
locations) was up by 7.5 percent to 38,947. Audi can thus report the largest
number of employees in the company's history. 

		"Our sustained healthy progress is a credit to the great
commitment of the workforce and to the innovative prowess of the company",
remarked Chairman of the Board Dr. Franz-Josef Paefgen. "We are optimistic
that, despite the present risks which the global economy harbours, we again
will enjoy success in 1999 and achieve renewed growth."