Andrew Smith/Photography Editor
Audi is reporting 2007 as its most successful fiscal year of all-time.

AUDI AG has announced record figures for the fiscal year 2007. High profit margins were achieved for production, vehicle sales, revenue and profit, said Rupert Stadler, chairman of the board of management.

"We're looking back on the most successful fiscal year in the history of our company: We have achieved the 12th consecutive record year for vehicle sales and we were able to increase all of the key financial figures to new record levels - we call that qualitative growth, since only profitable growth can secure our competitiveness in the long term," he reported, at a recently held press conference in Ingolstadt.

With a rise of 5.7 per cent in vehicle sales, the Audi Group's sales revenue for the 2007 fiscal year attained a new record high of €33,617 million (?31,142) - an increase of 7.9 per cent. With an operating result of €2,705 million (€2,015), the company has registered significant growth of 34.2 per cent.

"This marks the highest profit from operating activities in the history of the company while also providing convincing evidence of the healthy and sustained growth of the Audi Group," emphasised Axel Strotbek, member of the board of management for finance and organisation of AUDI AG.

This success is particularly attributable to further improvements in the model mix through the sale of highly exclusive cars such as the Audi Q7, models from the TT family, the Audi A5 and the Audi R8 supersportscar. "This is reflected especially in the below-average rise in production costs in relation to the sales revenue - this is what we consider qualitative growth," Strotbek said.

At €2,915 million, the company once again recorded a new best figure for profit before tax. This represents a rise of 49.8 per cent. Profit after tax was at €1,692 million, up 26 per cent.

Significant growth

The Audi Group achieved significant growth of 4.4 percentage points in the return on investment, to 18.6 (14.2) per cent. The disproportionately sharp rise in earnings compared with revenue is also shown by the increase in the rate of return from 6.2 to 8.7 per cent. "This means that Audi is one of the most profitable companies in the international automotive industry today," was Strotbek's evaluation of this development.

Audi sold 964,151 (905,188) cars in the past year, an increase of over 6.5 per cent compared with the previous year. The brand with the four rings chalked up record results in more than 50 markets.

In an otherwise declining overall market, Audi sold 254,014 cars in Germany (257,792, down 1.5 per cent). With a record market share of 7.9 per cent, the company achieved its best level in the national competitive environment in its history as a premium manufacturer.

The company sold a record number of cars in western Europe, at 650,407 (631,380, up 3 per cent). The United Kingdom achieved the highest growth, with 100,712 cars sold (up 17.1 per cent). In eastern Europe, vehicle sales increased by one-third to 36,073 (27,083) units.

Market leader

The biggest single foreign market in 2007 was China (including Hong Kong), with 101,996 cars sold (81,708, up 24.8 per cent). In China, Audi remains the market leader by some distance in the premium segment. In J.D. Power's customer satisfaction survey, the carmaker once again took first place in this growth market. Audi sold 93,506 cars in the USA (90,116, up 3.8 per cent).

Audi is rewarding employee performance with a performance-related profit share, which will be distributed in May. This year's total profit-sharing bonus will amount to an average of almost €5,300 per employee. "Compared with the competition, we are in an extremely strong position with this high profit-sharing bonus and are thus once again proving our attractiveness as an employer," Stadler said.

Audi recognised the company's growing need for university graduates, especially engineers, with 600 new hires in 2007.

"While many other carmakers are cutting back on jobs, we're creating additional ones," Stadler added. This year, Audi will hire 800 university graduates and around 700 apprentices.