German entrepreneur August Horch helped create the automaker that bore his name but was pushed out by his business partners in 1909. He wasted no time in starting another car company. He couldn’t use his last name for legal reasons so he got creative. Horch literally translates to “listen!” in German; he named his new firm Audi, the Latin translation of the word.

Then, in an unexpected twist of fate, Audi merged with Horch, DKW, and Wanderer to form Auto-Union in 1932. Each company did its best to occupy a specific segment and avoid overlapping. This arrangement worked relatively well until the 1960s, when Volkswagen purchased a battered Auto-Union from Daimler-Benz and later added NSU to the fold. Audi came out on top when Wolfsburg began thinning its assets, but it came dangerously close to joining its peers in the pantheon of automotive history.

Still with us? Join us as we embark on a virtual visit of the Audi museum in Ingolstadt, Germany, to better understand the companies and the cars that helped turned Audi into a world-class luxury brand: