Audi leading rival BMW in worldwide luxury sales race
 

<p>Filed under: <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/category/sports/" rel="tag">Performance</a>, <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/audi/" rel="tag">Audi</a>, <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/bmw/" rel="tag">BMW</a>, <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/category/luxury/" rel="tag">Luxury</a></p><a href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/2015-audi-tt-geneva-2014/"><img alt="2015 Audi TT" data-credit="AOL" data-mep="166339" src="http://o.aolcdn.com/dims-shared/dims3/GLOB/crop/1238x831+19+0/resize/628x417!/format/jpg/quality/85/http://o.aolcdn.com/hss/storage/adam/fb07f4161f877809b7337e549 2f75689/2015-Audi-TT.jpeg" /></a><br />
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If you thought competition among the German luxury automakers was hot before, it looks like things are just getting started. For the first two months of the year, <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/audi/">Audi</a> has sold more cars than <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/bmw/">BMW</a> worldwide by just 383 cars.<br />
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Audi claims to have sold 242,400 vehicles through February, up 9.3 percent from last year, compared to 242,017 units from BMW, up 8.9 percent, in the same period. While the advantage is tiny, its implications could be huge because Bimmer has been the leader in the premium car segment for the last nine consecutive years. <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/mercedes-benz/">Mercedes-Benz</a> lags behind them somewhat at 229,630 vehicles through February. According to <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-11/audi-passes-bmw-in-sales-to-take-lead-in-luxury-car-sales.html"><em>Bloomberg </em></a>, at this time last year Audi had sold 429 fewer cars than BMW.<br />
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The growth is all part of Volkswagen Group's goal to become the world's largest automaker. <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2014/01/30/vw-worlds-second-best-selling-automaker-gm-third/">It currently ranks in second when its heavy truck businesses are considered</a>. The German automotive giant also wants to be the world's leading premium carmaker. "Competition in the premium segment is more intense than ever," said Audi CEO Rupert Stadler to <em>Bloomberg</em>.<br />
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Audi has never held the top spot among premium automakers for an entire year, but it's investing 22 billion euros ($30.5 billion) over the next five years to stay competitive. It unveiled the new <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/audi/tt/">TT</a> and <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/tag/audi+s1/">S1</a> at the <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/geneva-motor-show/">Geneva Motor Show</a> and is just putting the <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/audi/a3/">A3 sedan</a> on sale in the US.<br />
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Of course, there's still a lot of time left in the year for things to shake out, and BMW isn't going to give up its lead without a fight. It has the new the <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/bmw/x4/">X4</a>, <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/bmw/2+series/">2 Series Active Tourer</a>, refreshed <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/bmw/x3/">X3</a> and more on the way. It's quite the German grudge match.<p style="padding:5px;backgr ound:#ddd;border:1px solid #ccc;clear:both;"><a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2014/03/11/audi-leading-rival-bmw-sales/">Audi leading rival BMW in worldwide luxury sales race</a> originally appeared on <a href="http://www.autoblog.com">Autoblo g</a> on Tue, 11 Mar 2014 14:58:00 EST. Please see our <a href="/rss-term-of-use/">terms for use of feeds</a>.</p><h6 style="clear: both; padding: 8px 0 0 0; height: 2px; font-size: 1px; border: 0; margin: 0; padding: 0;"></h6><a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2014/03/11/audi-leading-rival-bmw-sales/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to this entry">Permalink</a>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<a href="http://www.autoblog.com/forward/20847545/" title="Send this entry to a friend via email">Email this</a>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2014/03/11/audi-leading-rival-bmw-sales/#comments" title="View reader comments on this entry">Comments</a>

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