"Such a car is under development," Audi CTO Ulrich Hackenberg tells Auto Express. "It is under development and will be in the market for around 2017 but it will not be a sports car." Audi recently started selling a plug-in hybrid in the form of the A3 e-tron, and has plans to bring the tech to other cars in its range. Will the company's first true consumer EV will be a modified version of an existing car or an all-new model? Audi is remaining coy for now, but expect to hear a lot more about the EV before it launches in 2017.

Update (12/3): About that "will not be a sports car." CEO Rupert Stadler tells Bloomberg that Audi's first EV "is probably going to be a crossover, but development work is still ongoing."