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Honda China struggling with high-end Accord because Chinese covet German cars, too

It's not particularly unusual to see cheap cars in China, or those with designs stolen from foreign competitors, but increasingly the best-selling vehicles there would be very recognizable to just about any auto enthusiast. There appears to be one fact of life whether looking at car buyers in Sacramento, Stuttgart or Shanghai: People who can afford to buy premium cars often look first at the Germans.
Honda recently thought that it could challenge this perceived wisdom by including a premium Accord in the ninth-generation sedan's Chinese launch last year. The market-exclusive version was priced against the Audi A4. The venture failed, miserably.
According to Automotive News China, sales for the new Accord in China are down 37 percent through May of this year. Honda's overall sales are actually up by about 11 percent there on the strength of smaller, less profitable models. However, the company is still off its forecast 19-percent rise.

Audi SQ7 coming, will have electric turbo

Formula 1 and endurance racing are already harvesting energy from turbos on the track, and now it's apparently time for a similar idea of boosting the efficiency of forced induction to hit the streets in a high-performance, diesel SUV.
In a recent interview with the UK's Autocar, Audi technical boss Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg let the big news slip. "The new Q7 will be available in the market next year but the electric turbo will come a bit later in the Audi SQ7 available in 2016," he said. The e-turbo system was already rumored for the premium SUV but for the standard model, not this just-announced performance version.
Audi has been experimenting with the e-turbo system for a little while, as an electrically driven supercharger. It showed up on the RS5 TDI concept that used a 3.0-liter, twin-turbocharged diesel V6 plus the electric system to diminish turbo lag. In that application, it provided an impressive 385 horsepower and 553 pound-feet of torque and an alleged sprint to 62 miles per hour in 4 seconds. Although, Dr. Hackenberg didn't make it clear if this was the exact layout for the SQ7.

2014 Audi RS7 priced from $104,900* in the US [w/video]

Audi has officially priced the svelte 2014 RS7 from $104,900 (*not including $825 for destination), undercutting its sole competitor, the BMW M6 Gran Coupe, by $8100. Even when we're talking about six-figure super sedans, that's not a small amount of money. And soon, this class of sleek stormers will be joined by the updated Mercedes-Benz CLS63 AMG 4Matic.
With its combination of a twin-turbocharged, 4.0-liter, 560-horsepower V8 engine and Audi's excellent Quattro all-wheel drive, the RS7 is expected to hit 60 miles per hour in just 3.7 seconds, 0.4 seconds faster than the manufacturer estimate for the M6 Gran Coupe.
We've already given the RS7 a thorough shakedown in Europe, and we came away quite impressed with just how stunning this Audi is, both to drive and to look at. Now that we've got a price to go along with the performance and style, this Audi is even more appealing - in our high-dollar dreams, anyway. Take a look at a short video from Audi, as well as the official press blast, below.