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Traffic Light Information is the first true Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) service by an automobile brand The service starts up with variations on the Audi A4 and Q7 in Las Vegas Networking is essential for autonomous driving in cities If you know in advance when a traffic light will switch from red to green, your driving is more relaxed and efficient. Audi is the first automobile brand to connect the car to the city infrastructure – an important step towards autonomous driving. In Las Vegas, starting immediately, the Audi A4 and Q7 models can display traffic-light phases directly in the car. Further U.S. cities will follow, and introduction of the system is planned in Europe. Traffic Light Information optimizes traffic flow, saves valuable time and reduces environmental impact. Audi of America is cooperating with several cities in North America to upgrade the infrastructure for V2I technology. “For the first time, our cars are exchanging data with traffic infrastructure in real time. Drivers can adapt their behavior to the situation and move through city traffic in a much more relaxed and controlled way,” says Andreas Reich, head of Electronics Pre-Development at AUDI AG. “We increase energy efficiency when we connect our Audi models to smart cities. Further V2I services will follow, making the car into an interactive mobile device. We see autonomous driving as the end of this development.” As a first step, all Audi A4 and Q7 models produced for the U.S. market since June 2016 and equipped with Audi connect will have this function on board. In the USA, municipal traffic management centers will communicate the traffic-light data to Audi’s project partner Traffic Technology Services TTS. Here the data are prepared and sent to the on-board computer in the Audi via a fast Internet connection, for example 4G/LTE, in real time. The first function of the Traffic Light Information V2I component is called Time-to-Green.

Audi is the world’s first automotive brand to network its series-production models with city traffic lights. In the USA, Audi customers have already been using the vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) service Traffic Light Information since late 2016.

Headlight digitization is blazing new trails in safety, design, and communication Three new functions in Digital Matrix LED headlights that enhance safety and improve the customer experience Digitizing light technology opens up new possibilities and individualization Audi TechFocus Newsletter #03 Safety and customer satisfaction come first at Audi. They are part and parcel of the success of the company with the four rings. In that context, light technology is steadily growing more important and creating a wider range of possibilities and perspectives, from added safety for the driver, to external communication and individualization. Systematic light digitization is making all of this possible. It is particularly visible in the new Audi A8: the forward-looking Digital Matrix LED headlights and digital OLED rear lights raise the customer experience to a whole new level: for the first time in any Audi model, light is completely digitized. The car can be individualized even further through its digital OLED rear lights. The Digital Matrix LED headlights also include three new functions: advanced traffic information, a lane light with direction indicator lights on highways, and an orientation light on country roads. These features not only demonstrate Audi’s “Vorsprung durch Technik,” they also add value. “Lighting technology and lighting design have been success factors for our brand for decades, becoming a key area for Audi. This has allowed us to continue setting new benchmarks in the automotive industry,” explains Oliver Hoffmann, board member for Technical Development. “The digitization of lighting enables us to offer completely new functions that we can use to increase safety again significantly. For example, in combining the digital OLED taillights with proximity indication, we can communicate with the outside world depending on the situation.

In keeping with its current special exhibition “The Speed of Light”, Audi Tradition would like to invite you to an evening of lectures at the Audi museum mobile. On Monday, March 13, Dr. Michael Hamm and Dr. Michael Kruppa will trace the evolution of vehicle lighting from its earliest days up to present times, and then offer a preview of where lighting is heading. Admission is free, but registration by March 9 is essential. After the lectures, you will have an opportunity to look around the special exhibition and talk to both speakers. Dr. Michael Hamm and Dr. Michael Kruppa are both renowned experts in the field of lighting. In addition to their name, they also share a passion for light: Dr. Hamm was head of headlight development at Audi from 2012 to 2022. During that time, he introduced numerous innovations, including LED and Matrix LED headlights, and laser as an additional high beam. He is currently a visiting lecturer in traffic light technology at TU Darmstadt and also works as a journalist. Dr. Michael Kruppa has been with Audi since 2013 and dedicated to lighting development since 2016: as head of lighting development, he developed the digital OLED taillights, which are an indispensable part of the Audi-portfolio, together with his team. Now he works as head of front lighting development. The special exhibition “The Speed of Light” at the Audi museum mobile in Ingolstadt is, for the first time, telling the full story of lighting development through the rich product history of the brand with the four rings. The special exhibition looks back to the beginnings of vehicle lighting – when early automobiles still used actual fire for illumination. Ten vehicles trace the various epochs in lighting technology, while other exhibits illustrate the functionality and the fascination of constantly evolving headlight and rear light technologies. “The Speed of Light” will be on display in the Audi museum mobile until June 4.

Advanced lighting technology makes a significant contribution to greater road safety and is an essential part of Audi DNA. The new A6 Avant also plays a pioneering role in its class in this area. The design of the headlights and rear lights is all about digitalization, which gives drivers the opportunity to customize the appearance of their A6 Avant according to their own preferences. At the same time, the digital lighting display provides innovative functions that improve communication with other road users. All the while, the lighting technology reflects typical Audi aesthetics. Optional equipment for the A6 Avant includes digital LED daytime running lights made up of 48 individual LED segments per headlight. The optional Matrix LED headlights are characterized by a hexagon-perforated stainless-steel screen that conceals the digital daytime running lights. This new design gives the headlights an even more striking appearance. With a total of seven digital light signatures at the front and rear – several of which are designed as active signatures in which individual segments intelligently brighten up and dim down – the new A6 Avant offers considerable potential for personalization. The second-generation digital OLED rear lights are optionally available at the rear of the A6 Avant and combine lighting design and innovative technology in a unique way. Thanks to the total of eight digital OLED panels, they create a strong recognition value and at the same time increase safety on the road. Each side features 198 OLED segments that create the digital signatures, some of which are active. The active signatures make the lights appear alive through their constant movement. The algorithm specially developed for this function creates a new image from the 396 OLED segments several times per second. The individual segments interact in such a way that the overall light intensity does not vary.

Digitization of light opens up multi-faceted communication channels Audi lighting technology combines exceptional design with high functionality Close teamwork between Lighting Technology and Light Design as a success formula Audi is advancing into new dimensions in automotive lighting technology. Originally, vehicle lighting mainly served the purpose of ensuring traffic safety for all road users. Previously unknown prospects are now opening up in the wake of digitizing headlights and rear lights: light becomes a medium of external communication and interaction, personalizes design, and provides customers with new styling and customization options. Lighting has made a veritable technology leap: The evolution from halogen light to xenon headlights to LED technology in automobiles took less than two decades. These milestones of new technologies provided customers with noticeably added value. As well as continually enhancing visibility, Audi lighting has been defining the face of the brand’s models in every era while extending everyday usability by an equally communicative and aesthetic dimension. In the wake of the transformation of lamps, both illumination and energy efficiency improved. Now, digitization provides another innovation boost with all-new design potential: Light is becoming smart. By means of light signals, the car interacts with its surroundings. As far back as in 2003, the then A8 offered adaptive light with automatic-dynamic headlight range control before a camera on the windshield began detecting other road users in 2010. Two years later, the brand underpinned its innovative prowess and pioneering role in the R8: The introduction of the dynamic turn signal that allows indicated directional changes to be perceived out of the corner of one’s eye marked a significant gain in safety – and still does.

With the second generation of digital OLED rear lights, the Audi A6 e-tron is taking light design, range of functions, and road safety to a new level. With these innovations, the A6 e-tron is the leader in its class in the field of advanced lighting technology. The active digital light signature, a world first introduced with the Audi Q6 e-tron, makes a new and vibrant impression, pointing the way to the future of lighting technology at Audi. The second generation of digital OLED technology shapes the appearance of the new Audi A6 e-tron and significantly increases its range of functions. This technology significantly improves road safety, as impressively demonstrated by the communication light in the digital OLED rear lights. Audi is also underscoring its leading role in personalization: With eight digital light signatures in the redesigned digital daytime running lights in the Matrix LED headlights and in the digital OLED rear lights 2.0, drivers can customize the appearance of their A6 e-tron to suit their personal taste. These customizations are easy to make via the MMI or the myAudi app. Active digital light signature: harmony in motion Headlights and rear lights that appear alive at first glance: This is how customers can think of the active digital light signature. “We’ve given the light signatures their own personality and the digital world its own aesthetics at the same time,” explains César Muntada, Head of Lighting Design. The second-generation digital OLED rear lights have ten 450-segment OLED panels that use a specially developed algorithm to generate a new image several times a second. This allows the active digital light signature to demonstrate the car’s vibrancy and ability to interact by making the “brain waves” of the A6 e-tron visible through constant movement. A software module on one of the domain computers of the Audi A6 e-tron makes this type of light signature possible.

From the incandescent lamp to the digital high-tech application: light-years of progress with Audi Halogen incandescent lamps enabled initial technical improvements that also affected the look of automobiles. With free-form headlights in the nineteen-eighties and clear lens covers in the late nineteen-nineties, designers were increasingly able to use light as a styling element to define the face of Audi models. The second-generation xenon headlights in the 1994 Audi A8 and the tiltable modules from 2003 onward marked development leaps that elevated the quality of light and the customer’s experience to a new level. The technology of LED light introduced in 2008 was used by Audi to make a veritable quantum leap. It replaced the previously unsegmented and indivisible lighting units, significantly surpassing the efficiency, range and illumination performance of the previous headlights. In addition to this technical progress, light-emitting diodes permitted much higher degrees of freedom in designing the light source, so light as a styling element acquired much greater significance. Segmentation as a Matrix and digitization expanded the potential even further: The lights of an Audi no longer serve the mere purpose of providing illumination. They create a new customer experience by pioneering external communication including social interaction as well as enabling a wide variety of lighting design choices. Headlight technology: looking ahead In 2004, Audi used light-emitting diodes for the first time in LED headlights, in the daytime running light of the Audi A8.Light-emitting diodes are semiconductors that can directly convert electrical energy into light. They operate with particularly high efficiency: their energy consumption is low and their light output high. In 2008, the first full LED headlights followed in the Audi R8. Today, headlights with LED technology are standard equipment in all model ranges – except for the Audi A1 as an entry-level model.