Ipod has dominated the MP3 market because Apple went beyond the hardware and created an ecosystem where people could conveniently buy music legally online. Then Apple topped itself with the iPhone and the App Store. Similarly, Better Place promotes the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) by building and operating the infrastructure and network systems to optimize energy access and use. Instead of asking consumers to pay a premium for the EVs with the battery, a consumer can buy a EV and lease the battery separately. Battery switching stations are provided for customers to swap out the low charge battery with a fully charged one. Thus battery technology upgrade will be no cost to the EVs’ owners and the travel range is no longer an issue. Israel and Denmark have already signed up.
Hopefully, this innovation will dispel the fears of consumers against the adoption of EVs.
http://www.betterplace.com/
3 replies on “Beyond the electric car, a Better Place”
I first heard of Better Place 2 years ago when Shai Agassi spoke at a CET lecture on campus and what struck me most was their issue of scale. Their primary innovation problem was creating a the availability of an electric fuel system overnight. This meant they needed a large amount of up front capital to build the first enclosed system of EV drivers. The upshot of this is that they needed a leader to raise enormous amounts of capital. Shai was able to raise the most first round venture capital money in history.
What is interesting about Shai is that he is not a car guy so to speak. He is a former executive at SAP in technology products. In this regard, I don’t think they chose him because he could build the product, they chose him because he had such a strong network.
When you look at where Better Place is being first implemented, Israel and Denmark, this becomes even more clear. Shai is a native Israeli and worked at the German company SAP. He is also a resident of California, which also happens to be another geographic location adopting Better Place.
btrinh,
when I first heard of this project by Mr. Agassi two years ago, he proposed to charge users by the number of miles they drive like telecom charging subscribers for minutes used. However, I could not find any information about money on the website.
Renault and Nissan are connected, therefore, it makes sense that the Nissan Leaf came out of nowhere.
I don’t know what is the state of their pricing system. I always found his analogy to the cell phone really strange because it didn’t encapsulate all the ideas that the BetterPlace system represents. We don’t have battery replacing stations for cell phones for instance. I think he primarily used it as a communication device, whether it was a good one or not, you can decide for yourself.
Nissan’s entrant into the electric car business did come out of no where. Decidedly less advanced as the Tesla offerings, I think it was a good move on their part to put a more economical car out there with clear marketing goals. Have you seen website and advertisements ? They look gorgeous. Can’t say the same about the car though.