Next-gen Audi SQ5 set for 2025

Audi Australia is planning a mid-2025 release for its new-generation Q5 medium SUV and SQ5, with the local line-up primed to feature plenty of NVES-appeasing hybrids.

Speaking to carsales at the local Q6 e-tron reveal in Sydney last week, Audi Australia director Jeff Mannering said the company was in the thick of negotiations with the factory for the new Q5 and SQ5, confirming both the regular Q5 and sporty SQ5 models are planned for arrival here around June next year.

“The next car [after the arrival of Q4 e-ton in November and Q6 e-tron in January] is the Q5, that will be the next big thing.

“It’s probably coming mid next year – we’ve got a proposal we are negotiating with the factory.

“We’ll offer a range of variants, because it is a popular vehicle, and we can tell you that we’re bring the S and we’re bringing a regular Q.”

Mannering said the key to the Q5/SQ5 powertrain mix was the New Vehicle Emissions Standard (NVES) which will come into effect as of January 1, 2025, and hinted at the need to continue offering hybrids in the Q5 portfolio, such as the Audi Q5 55 TFSI e.

“I don't think we're in a position to talk about engines yet,” he said.

“We’re actually only yesterday, talking about Q5, which ones we’ll do. We’re just sorting out what engine portfolio we will bring in, because it’s a little bit more complicated now, because of the regulations with the government.

“We just have to make sure that you’ve got to offset some petrol cars with some electric cars and some PHEVs, and that’s what we’re in the middle of right now.”

Mannering said the model matrix was not that difficult to create to ensure Audi meets the 2025 emissions requirement for its car parc.

“It’s not too complicated because it’s only CO2,” he said. “I was in Korea for a couple of years, and it was CO2, NoX, and a whole different range of topics that you had to deal with, which are really complicated.

“Here, it’s not that complicated. It’s just because we technically know our CO2 grams.

“We work with the research and development guys in Germany,?they know what engines and what goals they’re trying to achieve in the next four to six years.

“We don’t know all the technology, we’re not privy to it because it’s still top secret in Germany.

“But they do some predictions. We know what the portfolio is going to be with the engines that we are selecting from.”

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