“Step into your sphere” – Audi at the 2023 OMR Festival

The progressive architecture and premium ambience of Audi’s booth at OMR 2023 will invite visitors to come and stay for a while on May 9 and 10. At the same time, the booth’s interactive digital elements provide a playful opportunity to get to know the brand and its technology and discover the driving experience of the future – visitors are sure to be thrilled. 

In addition, two keynote speakers will represent the brand with the four rings: Giorgio Delucchi, Head of Digital Experience and Business at AUDI AG, and Stephan Fahr-Becker, Exterior Design, AUDI AG, will be speaking at the Conference Stage under the heading “Design & Digital: How Audi is driving transformation”. At the Red Stage, under the title “Insight into Audi Design: Aesthetic Intelligence”, Stephan Fahr-Becker will also provide insight into the work of Audi designers. Both keynote speeches can be streamed live and will also be available afterwards in the Audi MediaCenter.

The Audi brand will offer a firsthand experience through four panel discussions focused on its strategic brand fields, including digital, performance, design, and sustainability. In addition to Audi speakers Patrick Lins (Concept Development UI/UX), Tim Miksche (Head of Audi Denkwerkstatt), Stephan Fahr-Becker (Exterior Design), and Dr. Michael Müller (Head of Global Brand Strategy, Customer Insights), panelists Aya Jaff (founder and author, Forbes 30 under 30 keynote speaker), Dr. Cornelius Ringe (WESOUND), Michala Rudorfer (investor and founder), Annika von Mutius (Empion), Jennifer Baum-Minkus (gitti Conscious Beauty), Dirk Pape (LinkedIn Marketing Solutions), Kerstin Weng (Vogue Germany), and Ayke Bogen (Condé Nast) will provide exciting insights.

“Our goal is to continue to surprise our customers with new experiences. That’s why we decided to design our experience at the trade fair stand without a show car for the first time and to focus on people, their feelings and their experience – completely independent of drive forms or models,” says Linda Kurz, Head of Marketing Germany, AUDI AG.

The Sphere concept cars such as the current Audi activesphere concept were the inspiration for the exhibit. Always ready for an adventure in nature or in the urban jungle, the car is a master of metamorphosis, both inside and out. Its innovative operating concept blends the physical and virtual worlds (“mixed reality”) by projecting information, content, and interactive elements onto the surfaces and into the spaces inside the car. By taking a people-centered approach, Audi is breaking with previous conventions of car design in the development of its concept cars.

Audi puts people at the center

In the past, cars were initially thought of from a technological perspective. This orientation set the car’s direction and helped determine the look, features, interior, and even the seating position of the passengers. Audi is now turning this on its head. In the Audi of the future, the focus is on people as individuals. True to Audi’s booth motto at the OMR Festival, “Step into your sphere”, the brand with the four rings is developing the car around these individuals as a “Personal Sphere” – an interactive space that is systematically designed from the inside out. Audi is bringing the future interior experience the Personal Sphere promises to life at its trade fair booth.

The Audi of the future combines an appealing design, high-quality materials, and digital elements to create a seamless and customizable user experience. Cars developed from the user’s perspective outward offer a smart, intuitive, and personal experience. With its interactive space at the OMR Festival, Audi wants to focus on the crucial role played by the individual’s senses and emotions, not to mention data security, when interacting with digital technology.Audi prioritizes design from the inside out, turning the car interior into a crucial interface between people and the brand by placing co-creation at the forefront and making technology available as needed, as demonstrated in the development of the Audi urbansphere concept vehicle where the company actively collaborated with Chinese customers to incorporate their wishes and ideas.

Holistic ecosystem extends the personal sphere beyond the car

Digitalization and connectivity are opening up entirely new opportunities for interaction in and around the car. The number of customer touchpoints is increasing exponentially. With its holistic ecosystem, Audi is leveraging these touchpoints to offer its customers an integrated user experience anytime, anywhere. The key to Audi’s digitally connected world is the myAudi app.

Users can already experience many aspects of this ecosystem today. Functions on demand, for example, Audi lets customers adapt the configuration of vehicle functions to suit their needs, even after the car has been purchased. There is also the digitalized sales process with virtual services such as Audi Live Consultations and a system for reserving new and used cars online. Audi will add even more elements to its digital ecosystem in the future.

Trust as a prerequisite for unique experiences and new services

Nowadays, generating and intelligently analyzing data allows for the provision of customized services and settings, but trust is a crucial prerequisite for creating unique digital experiences like those found in the trade show booth and today's and tomorrow's cars, as users who are willing to share their data can gain the most from the added value of personalized services. This makes users’ trust in the security of their personal data a decisive enabler. For this reason, Audi relies on a privacy concept that offers the best possible transparency as well as the greatest level of security. It’s an approach that lets Audi take a range of personal preferences into account when handling people’s data. Visitors will also be able to experience this commitment to trust at the Audi booth at the OMR Festival.

Giorgio Delucchi says: “Audi cares about security – both in our cars and in our digital world. Because customer trust is our top priority. We never collect or use data without our users’ explicit consent and only do so in compliance with strict privacy laws.”

OMR x Audi: A long-standing partnership

The first OMR Festival took place in 2011, and since then the event has grown year after year, with more than 70,000 visitors in 2022. Today, OMR offers a platform for keynote speeches, master classes, and side events with more than 800 speakers on six stages, an exhibition area with more than 1,000 exhibitors, and a unique atmosphere. Visitors can also look forward to performances by renowned musicians and bands as well as parties.

Audi has been a partner since the very beginning and is now the main sponsor of the event for the third time in a row. Linda Kurz says: “The OMR Festival combines the latest developments in technology and digital marketing with an innovative and lively community. For Audi, it’s the perfect place to showcase our progressive and people-centric mindset.” For the first time, the four rings will be present on-site at a large exhibition stand without a display vehicle, deliver a MasterClass with four panel talks, and will be represented on two stages with keynotes.