VW USA UNVEILS THE I.D. CROZZ AT THE LOS ANGELES AUTO SHOW
Today VW launched the I.D. Crozz Concept EV at the Los Angeles Auto Show. The German automaker aims to be the global leader in electric mobility with the release of 15 different VW EVs globally by 2025.
The I.D. Crozz is an all-electric compact SUV, first unveiled in April at the Shanghai Auto Show, sized similarly to the 2018 Tiguan in a four-door coupe shape, with the interior space of a mid-size SUV. According to President and CEO of Volkswagen Group of America, Hinrich J. Woebcken “The I.D. CROZZ-based electric vehicle will be an affordable and stylish electric SUV—and there is more to come!”. The I.D. Crozz will precede the VW I.D. Buzz which is expected in 2022.
I.D. Crozz Drivetrain
The 300 miles (480km) I.D.CROZZ is equipped with an 83-kWh lithium-ion battery and two electric motors, one on each axle. The 4MOTION enabled drivetrain provides a combined power of 302hp and uses the rear motor with 201hp as the primary driving force and the front motor with 101 horsepower automatically engage when needed for traction, or it can be switched on for off-road use or snowy conditions.
All Volkswagen I.D. vehicles I.D. CROZZ can recharge 80 percent of its energy in 30 minutes via a 150 kWh DC fast charger.
I.D. Crozz Style and Design
The I.D. Crozz engages with its occupants by greeting its driver and passengers with a 360-degree light show. When the electric doors are opened, the sensor fields pulsate.
The front doors of the I.D. Crozz open to an unusually wide 90 degrees. The rear doors open via a sliding action allowing the owner to carry a bicycle sideways behind the front seats. The rear seats offer legroom that’s comparable to a luxury car’s and fold up when needed for storage.
The interior of the I.D. CROZZ uses an “Open Space” design concept to create an airy, flexible cabin with lounge-like amenities, from the Alcantara-covered quilted seating surfaces to the motion-controlled virtual light shade—a feature of the panoramic glass roof that uses LED strips to illuminate the interior.
The I.D. CROZZ is controlled with the electrically adjustable and retractable multifunction steering wheel, an Active Info Display, an electronic rear-view mirror (e-Mirror), an augmented reality heads-up display and digital door panels. Features in the I.D. Crozz is operated by voice and gesture control, touch displays or capacitive button fields. The middle of the instrument panel features a 10.2-inch touch tablet that handles infotainment, HVAC, and communications functions.
With the help of “Smart Lights,” the driver gets visual cues in the form of interactive light signals in navigation and potentially hazardous situations. For example, if the vehicle detects a pedestrian on the right side of the car the Smart Light flashes a red signal from this direction.
VW Self-driving system
The I.D. Crozz concept features Volkswagens self-driving system, the I.D. Pilot, but vehicle owners will have to wait to experience the I.D.Pilot which will only be deployed from 2025. The voice-controlled I.D. Pilot uses four laser scanners that pop up from the roof, as well as ultrasonic and radar sensors, side area view cameras and a front camera. The ambient lighting in the I.D. CROZZ is light blue, while in automated I.D. Pilot mode the lighting switches to red.
VW ID CROZZ SPEC SHEET
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China, which accounts for nearly 40% of the global EV market, has always been one of the Tesla’s (TSLA) target markets. Tesla entered the Chinese market in 2014, early in its global expansion phase. The strategy has paid dividends and China currently is US automaker’s biggest market outside of the USA. To date, Tesla has sold around 250,000 of the Model S and Model X worldwide of which over 10% was sold in China. Tesla now accounts for nearly 3% of all EVs on Chinese roads, by far the most of any foreign-owned automaker in the electric vehicle sector.
The Chinese Government has always been very protective of its auto sector enforcing a strict 50/50 ownership policy on foreigners wanting to manufacture locally. Although Tesla is currently in negotiations to establish vehicle and battery manufacturing in Shanghai’s free trade zone, it will have to continue importing vehicles into China for at least another five years, exposing its operations to import tariffs. With China’s aggressive promotion of electric cars, Tesla will remain on the back foot to competitors with local production as Tesla models carry a 25% import tariff. Up to now, Tesla has been able to double its sales since 2015. Sales for 2017 are on track to double again despite a reduction in EV subsidies announced in January by the Chinese Government.
At some point, however, the high-end market will become crowded with local products, which will be at least 25% cheaper than that of Tesla’s imported vehicles. The introduction of the Model 3 will open a new segment for Tesla, but with delays in production, we can only see Tesla distributing the Model 3 in the Chinese market by 2019 at which point many other foreign makers will locally produce EVs. Various foreign auto brands have announced their intentions to produce a range of EVs exclusively for the Chinese market, including Tesla’s major competitors GM and the Nissan PSA Alliance.
Trade agreements announced during President Donald Trump’s recent visit to Beijing will, however, give Tesla’s sales some support. The Chinese Vice Finance Minister, Zhu Guangyao, announced on Friday the 10th of November 2017 that the country will gradually lower tariffs on imported vehicles. Minister Zhu went further announcing that the ownership restrictions on foreign manufacturers will be lifted very soon, allowing foreign auto brands to establish 100% owned plants in any one of the country’s eleven free trade zones. The minister did not give any timeframe on the easing of import duties though.
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FIRST TESLA NOW RENAULT BLURS THE LINE BETWEEN ENERGY AND CARS
The nature of electric vehicles is much closer related to its energy source than that of combustion vehicles. Historically auto companies, as a rule, stayed out of the production of their fuel source. Since the introduction of the Power Wall and acquisition of Solar City analysts refer to Tesla as an energy company, rather than an automotive company. Now Renault wants to mimic Tesla‘s business model through the creation of a new subsidiary, Renault Energy Services, which is to specialize in energy, smart grids, and electric mobility.
Renault sees the energy and smart grid sectors as fundamental to the expansion of electromobility. The new subsidiary will focus primarily on the development of smart charging, V2G (vehicle to grid) interaction and second-life batteries by collaborating with the energy sector or investing in smart-grid related projects.
Gilles Normand, SVP, of Electric Vehicles at Renault said – “The creation of Renault Energy Services marks an important step forward. Investing in smart grids is key to both reinforcing the lead we enjoy in the European electric vehicle market and accelerating the EV industry’s scale-up.”
Renault sees the benefit flowing to its EV customers as Renault electric vehicles connected to smart grids will be able to pay less electricity through optimized charging.
Although it’s not a new phenomenon for auto companies to invest in energy networks for charging, the commitments were more a necessity enforced by regulation and customers than a profitable venture. Renaults move to focus on smart grids through a subsidiary would be one of the first to focus on new business profits from energy. It will by no means be the last where we see auto companies and energy providers play in the same sandbox.
The EV snowball is getting bigger by the day.
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Comparing China’s popular pure electric SUVs – BYD Song vs Roewe eRX5
This year saw the launch of two much-anticipated pure electric versions of popular SUVs of 2016, the BYD Song EV300 and SAIC Roewe eRX5 EV400. Interest pre-launch was very high with the SAIAC Roewe eRX5 receiving 3,000 pre-orders in just 4 days.The mini-car segment has thus ben the best performer in the Chinese electric vehicle sector, but since the launch of
The mini-car segment has thus ben the best performer in the Chinese electric vehicle sector, but since the launch of these two models, the SUV segment has been the second best-performing segment. Since the launch of the BYD Song in May 2017 followed by the Roewe eRX5 a month later nearly 6,000 units have been sold, with the SAIC Roewe eRX5 holding the record for most sales in a month thus far.
Pricing:
Though the MSRP before incentives favors the BYD Song, the subsidized price of the vehicles is relatively the same, with the Roewe eRX 5 marginally lower. The lower price for the Roewe eRX5 is due to it benefiting from an extra 10% subsidy since its battery energy density is higher than 120Wh/kg. The eRX5 subsidy is therefore 72,600 yuan to total a sales price of 198,800 yuan, and the Song receives a 66,000 yuan subsidy, ultimately costing 199,900 yuan.
Charging: Left- SAIC Roewe eRX5 Right – BYD Song EV300
Battery:
The reason why the Roewe eRX5 has a better energy density is that it uses a Ternary Lithium battery, generating weight savings and resulting in longer mileage. The BYD Song on the other hand still uses a lithium iron phosphate battery which is heavier and packs less energy. We expect this to change in the near future as BYD has started using Ternary Lithium batteries in its plug-in hybrid models.
Charging:
The Roewe eRX5 pure electric version is equipped with a 7kW AC charger and higher power DC fast charger than the BYD Song EV300. The SAIC Roewe eRX5 charges on Level 2 in only 7 hours, compared to 10 of the BYD Song and fast charge to 80% full in 40 minutes whereas the Song takes over an hour.
Interior:
The BYD Song EV300’s styling, which is the same as the 2016 ICE and PHEV model is still very much according to the traditional BYD look and has not yet benefited from the recent appointment of Audi’s former head of design, Wolfgang Egger. The SAIC Roewe eRX5 styling, on the other hand, has a more western influence resulting in a stylish feeling and modern sense of technology due to its full LCD instrument panel (12.3 inch) and a 10-inch multimedia display.
Functionality:
BYD has a basic configuration, focused on practicality first. The BYD Song EV300 offers a multi-function steering wheel, leather seats, automatic air conditioning, color control of its multimedia screen, panoramic sunroof and much more, giving the owner real value for his money. The Song EV300 instrument panel fully embodies the characteristics of practical first. Although the interface is relatively simple, the functionality is reasonable and information rich. In addition, the Song EV300 has optional seat heating, which is not available in the eRX5.
The BYD Song EV300 still uses a traditional shift lever for driving mode selection, one of the few new EVs to still do so. The shifter selects between two driving models, energy saving and sports two driving modes. Energy recovery intensity can also be set. In addition, the Song EV300 also equipped with BYD’s unique mobile power plant technology, providing external power 220V AC for your outdoor equipment.
Although the eRX5 is seen as the more technologically advanced of the two vehicles the Song does not completely fall behind with 360 ° panoramic image, PM2.5 green net system, a Carpad multimedia system, TPMS tire pressure monitoring system and a BOS brake priority system.
The SAIC Roewe eRX5 benefits from ALIBABA and SAIC co-operating in 2016 to develop the first internet car, providing software and Internet functions such as Ali cloud and the Zebra Zhixingc internet-connection system. In addition, Roewe ERX5 is also equipped with dynamic energy management, remote control, battery doctors and other technical solutions. The 12.3 inch full LCD dashboard display is also remarkable. Unlike the BYD Song, the Roewe eRX5 uses driving control keys, concentrated near the gears. The MODE button is used to adjust the driving mode and the KERS button is used to adjust the energy recovery strength. The BATTERY button is inherited from the plugged-in version of the eRX5 but does not work on the pure eRX5. There are three driving modes, namely, standard, sports, energy saving. After switching the driving mode, the theme color of the dashboard changes. Although the Roewe eRX5 is not 4WD it is equipped with active anti-roll, steep slope slow down, ramp support and other functions. The Roewe eRX5’s central armrest incorporates an air purifier.
Interior and Controls: Left- SAIC Roewe eRX5 Right – BYD Song EV300
Tires:
The Roewe eRX5 is equipped with 235/50 R18 Michelin Primacy 3 ST Hao Yue tires and the BYD Song EV300 with 235/50 R19 Goodyear SUV series tires.
Luggage:
The eRX5 EV400 and its ICE and PHEV version has the same boot space and is not influenced by the battery pack. The Song EV300 luggage compartment floor is elevated by 4cm from its ICE version. The Rowe eRX5 has a front compartment of 60L, just enough for two backpacks under the engine cover.
Power:
In terms of power, the Roewe eRX5 falls short to the BYD Song, delivering only a maximum power of 85kW (116Ps) and maximum torque of 255Nm from its permanent magnet synchronous motor. The Song EV300 delivers 160kW (218Ps) and maximum torque of 310Nm from its permanent magnet synchronous motor.
Conclusion:
Both vehicles have pro’s and con’s but since they are evenly priced the SAIC Roewe eRX5 with its longer range and technology trumps the BYD Song’s extras in my opinion. BYD might be the undisputed leader in Chinese electric vehicle market for the moment but the entry of models such as the SAIC Roewe eRX5 will challenge BYDs position in the future
RENAULT NISSAN TO BUILD AN INTERCONNECTED EV FOR CHINA
The Renault Nissan Alliance and Dongfeng Motor Group forged a partnership to co-develop electric vehicles in China according to a press release by Nissan. The new JV company is called eGT New Energy Automotive Co and will focus on the core competencies of each to produce EVs for the Chinese market. The first vehicle by eGT will be an A-segment SUV based on the Renault Nissan platform and is expected in 2019. The vehicle will be an intelligent and interconnected EV, which is the new rage in China. Alibaba and SAIC released the first successful mass-market interconnected car last year, the Roewe eRX5 SUV. Since then various other companies and start-ups, such as XPENG, announced strategies to focus purely on interconnected vehicles.
“This project is the result of a joint effort to develop electric vehicles for the Chinese market, by the ‘Golden Triangle’ formed by Dongfeng, Renault, and Nissan, with an innovative business model,” said Zhu Yanfeng, Chairman of Dongfeng. “We expect to meet the transformation trend of the market in China; where cars are becoming light, electric, intelligent, interconnected and shared. This is also testimony of a deepened and strengthened strategic cooperation between the three parties.”
The new venture is owned 25% each by Renault and Nissan while Dongfeng will hold the remaining 50%. eGT will be headquartered in the City of Shiyan, Hubei Province and assembly of the EV will be done at the 120,000 capacity Dongfeng plant in Shiyan.
The featured image does not represent the new EV but is that of the 2018 Nissan Pathfinder.
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Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Co. Ltd (BAIC) is 60% owned by the Chinese Government. BAIC spun its electric vehicle business into a separate unit, Beijing Electric Vehicle Company (BJEV). The company raised $460mln in and IPO for its Electric Vehicle unit, drawing investors such as LE Holdings, the Chinese company with ties to Faraday Future and LeAuto. TheBJEV factory is situated in Caiyu, Daxing, Beijing. The vehicle bodies are welded in Zhuzhou Hunan province. BJEV has launched its new range of EV’s, called Arcfox. BJEV unveiled its first concept vehicles for the Arcfox sub-brand in 2016 which comprised of the tiny open top SUV, the Arcfox-1 and the performance model the Arcfox-7 which is based on the Formula E platform of the NextEV Racing team.
BAIC was founded in September 2010 and tried to acquire the intellectual property rights of GM unit, SAAB Automobile’s in 2009 for $200m but failed. The German company, Daimler AG, acquired a 12% shareholding in BAIC during November 2013. BAIC produces some of the best-selling electric vehicles in the country, the E150/160/200 series, the EU260, and EC180which is the top seller for 2017. The Daimler influence is clear in the design of the new BAIC EU260 model, which looks similar to the Mercedes C series.
BAIC BJEV is now in its third generation of EV technology and is the best-selling electric vehicle auto company in China. The company announced an aggressive five-year plan in 2016 whereby it aims to sell 500,000 per annum by 2020. At the end of 2015, the company was the fourth largest EV manufacturer in the world and has since improved its performance with a 156% jump in sales in 2016, putting it ahead of BYD. The company is planning the launch of the Arcfox 1 in 2017 followed by other pure electric models the BAIC Senova EX260 SUV and BAIC EH300. 2018 will see the release of BAIC EH300L SUV EV and EX400L SUV.
Click through to the BAIC’s page on wattEV2Buy to explore the past, present and future EV models by the Chinese automaker.
Thunder Power Holdings is a Hong Kong-based start-up hailing from Taiwan. The brand was officially launched on two occasions. The Asia Pacific brand launch was at the end of March 2017 in Hong Kong and included the signing of an agreement with the Catalan Government for the company’s European expansion. The second launch, this time for Mainland China, was held on the 23rd and 31st of May 2017 in Beijing and Shanghai.
Thunder Power have been developing EVs from 2011 and introduced its first concept vehicles, the Thunder Power Racer and Sedan in 2015 at the Frankfurt Auto Show. Production of Thunder Power electric cars is anticipated for 2018 at its assembly plant in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province China. A 10,000 sq.m prototype manufacturing facility has already been completed in the first half of 2017 on the company’s 165-acre site. When completed the plant will have a capacity of 100,000 units per annum. The plant is a joint venture with the Guangzhou municipal investment fund, the GanNan Fund. The investment from the fund is around 2.5 billion yuan and is expected to drive a total investment of 7.5 billion yuan.
The Thunder Power EV strategy is to be a global player and includes a second plant in Catalonia, Spain, where it has already opened an R&D Center for an investment of €80 million. The plant is expected to be constructed to be ready for production by 2019.
Thunder Power won two awards for design at the 2016 Mondial de l’Automobile in Paris, albeit only for its logo and stand design.
Thunder Power’s first production EV is based on its Sedan Concept. The top-end sedan, designed by Dallara in Italy, will have a range of 650km from a 125kWh battery. The entry level sedan will start with an 85kWh battery and 200kW electric motor. The 320kWh Racer has a top speed of 240km/h. Thunder Power uses NMC (Nickel Manganese Cobalt) chemistry for its battery packs.
Thunder Power has opened orders for the sedan on its website. The Sedan is priced at around $72,000 (490,000 yuan).
Click through to the Thunder Power’s page on wattEV2Buy to explore the past, present and future EV models by the Chinese automaker.
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The relatively young GAC Motors is one of China’s best-respected vehicle brands. The company has a defined EV strategy and will add three models to its EV fleet in 2017.
Guangzhou Automobile Group Topped the “2016 BEST CHINESE CAR BRAND” Customer satisfaction survey.
Guangzhou Automobile Group Co, Ltd. founded in 2005 has various Joint Ventures with large international auto manufacturers such as Toyota, Hino, and Honda. Wanxiang Group, a large auto-parts manufacturer, and owner of Karma Automotive, previously known as Fisker Automotive, is one of the founding shareholders.
GAC MOTOR established its New Energy division at the end of 2015. The division focused on developing its R&D and production to penetrate the growing Chinese market for EV’s. The New Energy strategy is supported by GAC Group’s “1513” new-energy development strategy which makes the development of an R & D platform, R & D of core technologies a key development direction for its products.
GAC has international ambitions and aims to establish sales and service networks in 14 countries, including North America, Africa, South and Eastern Europe and South East Asia. GAC has reaped the rewards of creating a world-class vehicle brand and sold more than 380,000 vehicles in 2016, compared to around 194,000 the previous year, and has achieved 80 percent compound annual growth rate from 2011 to 2016. The company expects to sell 500,000 cars in 2017 and plans to produce 1 million cars in 2020. The Group targets 200,000 new energy vehicles in 2020 and meeting fuel consumption targets of 5.0L/100Km over its model range. In 2016 GAC Trumpchi delivered a total of 3,378 units of its GA5 PHEV model, an increase of 167% on 2015.
To support its strategy, Guangzhou Automobile Group passed two resolutions impacting EV development at its Board of Directors meeting on June 5th, 2017.
It was resolved that a new company would be established for the Groups New Energy Vehicle (NEV) program. The company would be named GAC New Energy Automotive Co. Ltd. and would be capitalized to the tune of RMB 300m.
It was further resolved to increase the GAC Motor’s capital with RMB 2.26b to expand its annual EV capacity of 200,000 units by 2020. GAC Motor is launching nine new Trumpchi models, of which three is NEV models, namely the GE3 BEV crossover, GS4 PHEV and GA6 PHEV.
GAC Motors are also pursuing other electric mobility solutions. In February 2016, Guangzhou Lixin Taxi Company owned by GAC Access launched more than 200 Levin twin-engine HEVs into Guangzhou taxi market. Also, GAC Group fully mobilizes the creativity of various business sectors and is actively devoted to new energy and energy conservation and environmental protection. GAC Motors and BYD established a JV in 2015 to co-operate in EV development. As a result, the company launched 400 pure electric buses produced by GAC BYD New Energy Bus Co., Ltd. into Guangzhou public transport system to provide services for citizens. The JV company is 51% owned by GAC and has a registered capital of 300m RMB.
Click through to the GAC Motors page on wattEV2Buy to explore the past, present and future EV models by the Chinese automaker.
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Renault and Powervault, the UK-based energy storage system manufacturer, announced a partnership to re-use electric vehicle (EV) batteries in home energy storage units. The saving to Powervault will make its storage system 30% cheaper, allowing its home storage system to become a financially viable solution to households across the UK.
Electric vehicle batteries are typically used until it depletes 20% of its capacity, after which it needs to be replaced, leaving a healthy portion of battery left for static battery applications, which are less demanding on the technology than the harsher requirements of transport applications. Typically an EVs battery can handle between 2,000 and 5,000 cycles or more depending on which supplier and what cell chemistry is used in the battery. BAIC models, for instance, using a LiFePO4 (Lithium Phosphate) based battery, guarantee 2000 cycles while the first Chevrolet Volt’s listed 5000 cycles. The Chevrolet Volt, however, electronically limits that only 65% of the battery is made available to the car to protect the battery, so to compare apples to apples, it would be better to compare throughput as appose to cycles.
Renault has already sold over 100,000 electric vehicles between its Zoe, Twizy, Kangoo and Fluence models, of which 25,000 are older than four years. Renault’s EV business model includes leasing its batteries to customers. Extending the usage of its batteries through a second-life application will provide Renault with a better return on investment and hopefully in future bring down the price of batteries faster.
According to the press release, Powervault will place 50 units on trail at existing customers who already have the company’s solar panels installed. The trial will explore the technical performance of second life batteries as well as customer reaction to home energy storage to help develop a roll-out strategy for the mass-market. The trial will be run with eligible customers of M&S Energy, plus social housing tenants and schools in the South East.
The relatively high cost of Home Storage Systems has until recently made little financial sense, with payback periods from savings overshooting the useful life of the system. Bringing system cost down to an acceptable payback of between five and seven years is seen as the holy grail for system manufacturers and homeowners.
Other EV manufacturers have already pursued business plans for second life batteries in Battery Home Systems with or without Solar. In June 2016 Nissan and Eaton installed an Energy Storage Solution in France, created from “second life” NissanLeafbatteries. Nissan installed the Energy Storage Solution at WEBaxys, a data center. In the same month, BMW announced that it would follow Daimler, Nissan, and Tesla in creating second life energy storage systems for residential and commercial use. Second life battery systems would not have the same warranties as new systems.
Extending the life of EV batteries will also result in lower recycling related cost and overall optimize the use of the battery. Second Life applications and applications such as Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G), where an EV owner sells power back to the grid, makes electric vehicles much more appealing and blows in the face of the technologies detractors.
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On the 1st of June 2017, VW and JAC signed a joint venture agreement to develop mass market electric vehicles in China. The agreement received the political support of both the German and Chinese Governments as it was signed in the presence of Chancellor Angela Merkel and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. Although the agreement was negotiated over a period of time it is significant that it was signed on the same day that Donald Trump took the USA out of the climate accord agreed in Paris 2015 in a move alienating the USA from the rest of the world.
VW and JAC will each hold 50% in the JV enterprise to develop, produce and market electric vehicles and mobility services with a key focus on mass market EVs over a 25 year period. The JV has already received a production certificate for 100,000 units last week as required by new Chinese regulations created in 2016 to regulate the EV sector. The value of the prospective 100,000 unit plant is set at $740million. VW has been operating in China since 1984 through partnerships with FAW, SAIC, and JAC and plans to deliver 400,000 electric vehicles to the Chinese market in 2020 and 1.5 million electric vehicles in 2025 as part of its electric vehicle strategy, named “TOGETHER – Strategy 2025”. It is planned that the new joint venture with JAC should produce its first jointly developed electric vehicle in 2018. The terms of the partnership according to a VW press release is as follows:
The agreement provides for the construction of a further factory as well as a research and development center. The joint venture also includes the development and production of components for new energy vehicles (NEV), the development of vehicle connectivity and automotive data services. In addition, it is intended that the joint venture should establish new used vehicle platforms and engage in all related business activities.
JAC Motors, China’s 10th largest auto manufacturer is a state-owned enterprise officially know as Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Co. Ltd and situated in Hefei, Anhui Province, close the larger Chery Auto. JAC Motors crafted its strategy for the electric vehicle segment, named “The Pure Electric Vehicle Development Plan” in 2002, making JAC an early mover in China and one of the most popular brands. In 2012 the company held the Top 1 position in China and thereby gaining the Top 3 place globally. At 2016 the company sold 22,000 new energy vehicles, bolstering it to showcase the largest range of electric vehicles at the Beijing Auto Show in 2015. JAC has also recently partnered with Carlos Sim to build vehicles in Mexico, taking advantage from Donald Trumps isolating policies there.
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In 2012 SAAB, the failed Swedish vehicle manufacturer was acquired by a group of Chinese shareholders and rebranded as NATIONAL ELECTRIC VEHICLES SWEDEN (NEVS). Now, five years later, the company is finally unveiling a concept if its much anticipated electric vehicle. NEVS had its fair share of troubles and ran into financial difficulty due to nonperforming partners. India‘s industrial giant, Mahindra and Mahindra owned a majority stake at some stage during the past five years as the company tried various financing structures.
Nonetheless, NEVS prevailed and is one of only fourteen EV manufacturers in China authorized to produce electric vehicles after receiving a production certificate for a 200,000 unit plant in January 2017. NEVS home city of Tianjin is a shareholder in the company through the municipal investment fund.
NEVS announced today that it will unveil a concept of the NEVS 9-3 EV at the upcoming CES Asia in Shanghai to be held from the 7th to 9th of June 2017 and that the production version is expected in 2018, a year later than expected. In 2016 NEVS announced that it sold 20,000 units to state aerospace company, Volinco over a three-year period starting from 2017. NEVS also announced in 2016 that it would supply 150,000 NEVS 9-3’s to Panda New Energy, a JV between go-cart producer Kandi Technologies and Geely.
NEVS also unveiled an SUV targeted at the fast growing segment in China, the NEVS 9-3X SUV Concept. Electric Vehicle watchers and consumers will be disappointed to notice that the shape and style of the NEVS 9-3 and 9-3X SUV changed very little from the earlier SAAB 9-3.
NEVS further announced that it would introduce the NEVS 9-3 EV in a pilot program with the support of the Tianjin Binhai Hi-tech Industrial Development Area (THT) in its hometown. The pilot program offers car-sharing and ride-hailing solutions in Tianjin, a city with 15 million inhabitants. The users will get access to all NEVS 9-3 EV series, but the company did not say how many NEVS 9-3 vehicles would form part of the pilot, elaborate on how the pilot will work or when it will commence.
NEVS released the following features of the NEVS 9-3 series in in press release today:
The new NEVS 9-3 series offer a high level of smart technology to enhance the in-car experience, such as WiFi hotspot, over-the-air software updates and battery management by smart-phone.
The new NEVS 9-3 series also offers a world-class filter of cabin air, “Always Clean Air Cabin” (ACAC), with a filter efficiency up to 99%. It takes less than a minute to reduce the hazardous particle levels for PM 2.5 from 500 to 50 µg/m3.
The new NEVS 9-3 series are based on more than 70 years of Saab Automobile engineering experience. This is mirrored by the outstanding driving and riding experience through a low center of gravity with smart suspension geometry and tuning.
The Swedish heritage showed in both design, high safety, and quality standards.
The new NEVS 9-3 series has already passed through rigorous comfort, ride and handling testing and will be launched to the market during 2018.
There are already more than 150’000 9-3 vehicles ordered, from different Chinese companies
The fleet management portal makes it possible to track and diagnose cars on the road in the distance, which will significantly enhance both the drivers’ and passengers’ safety and health.
300 km range
Prepared for mobility services:
Digital Car-key in smart-phone App
Fleet-Management Portal
Vehicle-control by smartphone
The new NEVS 9-3 series EVs will be built in NEVS’ China factories.
In February 2017Mercedes-Benz USA announced that Daimler would stop selling combustion based SmartForFour and ForTwomodels in the USA and Canadaand only focus onelectric models. Today Mercedes-Benz announced the pricing for the 2017 Smart Fortwo electric drive coupe and Cabrio to be released in the summer for the US market.
The new pricing for the iconic city electric vehicle will start at only $23,800 and $28,000 for the Cabrio. Pricing excludes federal and state tax incentives, levies, and a $750 destination and delivery charge. The competitive pricing is a clear indication of the downward spiral of electric vehicle cost that will soon see the technology compete on an even keel with combustion engines. The new SmartED price is $1,200 lower than the 2016 model, and it includes an improved 7kW onboard charger as opposed to only 3.3kW for the previous model. The battery capacity remains the same at 17.6kWh, but Mercedes improved the range estimation from 68 miles to between 70 and 80 miles on a full charge as a result of a change in the battery design, which now has 96 cells as opposed to 93. Charging time has also decreased due to the improved charging system. It will now only tale 2.5 hours tp charge the vehicle to 80% and 3 hours for a full charge as opposed to 6 hours for a full charge.
Mercedes replaced the liquid-cooled permanent- magnet synchronous electric motor with an air-cooled three-phase synchronous electric motor producing 80hp and 118 lb-ft torque resulting in an improved top speed of 81mph up from 78mph.
The SmartED is offered in three trims, pure, passion and prime trims (pure n/a on Cabrio), the electric drive features new value-added packages and options, including an exclusive Electric Green Tridion cell color and optionally available Climate Package, which includes heated seats, a heated steering wheel and provides additional insulation for climate control, comfort, and efficiency. The new design of the vehicle made a huge impact on the turning radius of the SmartED, which now sports a turning radius of only 22.8ft, down from 28.7ft.
The recent GM acquisition, OSVehicle, today unveiled the EDIT DIY self-driving car significantly lowering the barriers to entry for start-ups to develop autonomous vehicles. GM acquired OSVehicle in March 2017 for $1.1 billion in a bid to develop a self-driving “Vehicle-as-a -Service” (VaaS). OSVehicle had its debut at Y-Combinator in Silicon Valley where it introduced the TABBY EVOexposing the OSVehicle team to many conversations which they incorporated in the development of the EDIT.
Being 100% modular allows companies to repair, replace and adapt different components resulting a tenfold longer product lifetime, lower total cost of ownership and recyclability. Companies can also upgrade the connected car & self-driving modules as technology improves over time without discarding still viable components. EDITs modular technology allows you to easily embed several autonomous driving technologies from level 0 to 5 or add your own self-driving code and custom hardware stack of lidars, sensors, CPUs, etc.
EDITs friendly shape, which easily transformable according to the needs of the customer that could help the transition towards a different layout of the autonomous driving cars of the future. Being modular makes the EDIT easy to repair and upgrade, disrupting many sectors as we transition faster to a zero emission and zero fatality mobility. The body is divided into five primary parts, four molds (front, rear, roof and double symmetrical door), optimizing production and decreasing costs. The interior can provide different settings depending on the level of autonomous driving. In a level 5 version, there is a “vis a vis” seating layout with a comfortable table in the central area without steering wheel where you can work while commuting.
Barriers to entry as a result of cost and time to develop exclude many great start-ups and ideas from the self-driving sector. EDIT is a ready-to-use technology that saves years of R&D and millions of dollars. There is no need to reinvent the wheel for startups that are struggling with reverse engineering and to cost-effectively integrate the newest technology into the closed design of cars already in the market. EDIT allows start-ups to employ a “lean and distributed” manufacturing principle thereby avoiding huge investments in factories resulting in a reduction of more than 80% in initial costs. OSVehicle claims its IKEA like approach saves up to 70% of logistic costs and hacks import taxes by shipping ‘EDIT’ in components as opposed to complete vehicles. OSVehicle uses the example of Nepal where import duty on assembled vehicles is 238% compared to 3% for ‘EDIT components. OSVehicle did not provide any other guidance on the cost of the EDIT.
The disruption caused by the first ever ready-to-use Self-Driving EV will be felt in various sectors, including:
Ride and Car Sharing fleets don’t last more than two years due to heavy use. Vehicles that are modular, customizable and upgradeable prevent obsolescence, extending the life of a vehicle up to 20 years;
EDIT can be efficiently customized with heating and cooling components, disrupting commercial applications such as the Food Delivery Services;
Self-Driving Vehicle start-ups struggle with reverse engineering and to cost-effectively integrate new technology into the closed design of the traditional car. By adding non-integratable hardware to existing production vehicles, the interior and exterior designs of these vehicles could seem compromised. ‘EDIT’ is a production vehicle, future-proofed and designed specifically to be modular and always upgradeable.
EDIT is a white label platform for branding purposes whereby a brand can customize the exterior body and interior, still keeping the road legal certification. By being a Vehicle-as-a-Service solution companies can use EDIT to quickly deliver models tailored for each service and country. OSVehicle states that with the rise of food delivery, ride and car sharing, vehicles should focus on the service brand and its needs, not the car brand.
‘EDIT’ is designed in Italy by the OSVehicle team in collaboration with the design company Camal. EDITs design is compliant with European, US, and Asian safety regulations.
If you are only a hobbyist or ultra lean start-up wanting to build a self-driving car and find that the cost of EDIT is still too high, follow our advice in the earlier post. Just buy the OSVehicle TABBY EVO from as little as $12,000 and add to that George Hotz’s self-driving car kit which he plans to market through his company comma.ai at a price of $1,000.
The future is already here. Please feel free to share your thoughts on the EDIT DIY autonomous vehicle with the community in the comment section below or the OSVehicle forum on our app, that is if you have swiped right to “like” the EV.
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Elextra Cars lifted the lid on its electric supercar some more today. The start-up first announced the creation of the Elextra electric car at the end of February 2017. The Swiss automaker today unveiled a new website with clearer renderings of the electric vehicle and more detail on the performance and specifications of the EV. Robert Palm, the designer of the Elextra supercar and CEO of Classic Factory, informed wattEV2Buy that the price should be in the region of $400k to $500k. The start-up also invited potential investors to approach it.
Producing on demand may be a potential route for the company to bring the car to production. It is common practice for manufacturers of limited release vehicles to build a vehicle on demand. Earlier this year the start-up brand NIO announced it would produce sixteen NIO EP9 supercars on demand at a price tag of $1.48million. The practice of assembling electric vehicles on demand is not just limited to start-ups, Audi will also build you an Audi R8 e-tron on demand.
Robert Palm, the Swiss designer of the design company, Classic Factory, and Danish entrepreneur Poul Sohl were the founders of Elextra Cars, Poul Sohl is however not involved with the venture anymore. The Elextra supercar is a four seat four door 4-WD electric vehicle to be built in Stuttgart Germany. Elextra Cars only plan to build around 100 units. The Elextra Cars electric vehicle is expected to accelerate from 0 – 100km/h in less than 2.3 seconds (0 – 62mph).
The body of the Elextra supercar is completely crafted from carbon fiber. A lightweight carbon fiber shell is placed on a stiff and extremely strong carbon fiber tub, resulting in a weight reduction of around 25% compared to an aluminum body.
The drivetrain of the Elextra EV consists of a dual motor which provides an improvement over an AWD system. To provide traction for the powerful motors, generating a maximum combined power of 680hp, the torque is electronically disbursed to the front and rear wheels of the Elextra car. The top speed of the Elextra electric car is governed to 250 km/h. We can assume that the battery capacity is around 100kWh as Elextra did not provide details on the battery size or chemistry. The Swiss automaker indicated that the electric supercar could achieve a range of 600km (375miles) at a constant speed of 100km/h (62.5mph), which should be the most boring 600km of your life in a supercar of this nature.
Please feel free to share your thoughts on the Elextra supercar with the community in the comment section below or the Elextra Car forum on our app, that is if you have swiped right to “like” the EV.
A slew of self-driving pilot programs has been announced recently, the latest being Delphi. The auto parts company previously owned by GM announced that it would roll out self-driving taxis in the USA this year. Delphi is already piloting a program in Singapore where it pilots an Audi SQ5, kitted with 26 sensors. The pilot would be extended to three vehicles in June and is done in conjunction with the Singapore government where the company hopes to have operating taxi service within three years. According to Automotive News it is anticipated that Delphi will host the US pilot in either Pittsburg or Boston and that services would commence in September 2017.
Delphi’s pilot program allows passengers to see what the cars “brain” sees on a tablet, which it calls its “comfort cam”, soothing first-time users of the service. Already speculation is rife that Intel, which just last month paid a staggering $15 billion for Isreali autonomous tech company, Mobileye, would acquire Delphi. The three companies are already integrating their technologies to provide autonomous systems for car manufacturers, as soon as 2019.
Delphi would extend the pilot to Europe in the 3rd quarter and will switch its test vehicles to an undefined electric vehicle by 2018. The regulatory environment for public testing eased last week as Germany passed a law allowing for the public testing of autonomous vehicles.
Competitors, Lyft and Waymo also signed a partnership agreement this week. Waymo, previously know as Google’s self-driving program is already piloting Chrysler Minivans and Lexuses in Phoenix. The company last month invited people living in South East Phoenix to apply for the program, allowing the participant to hail a ride via a mobile app for local trips. Already as much as 10,000 such rides have been completed by Google staff. Waymo announced in April that it would increase its autonomous fleet from 100 to 600 Chrysler Pacifica minivans. It is no surprise that Waymo did not partner with Uber since Waymo claims that Uber stole some of its technology in an ongoing court case between the two companies. Reuters reported that according to Lyft the transaction is not exclusive, leaving the door open for other partnerships such as Lyft’s shareholder GM.
GM paid $500 million last year for a stake in the USAs number two ride-sharing company; the automaker also acquired Cruise Automation to spearhead its autonomous vehicle strategy. GM is very aggressive in the autonomous space, trying to carve out a lead to make up for ground lost to newcomers such as Tesla. GM is spending vast amounts of money to this end, for instance paying $1.1 billion to acquire its second Y Incubator company, the Italian based OSVehicle, to develop a self-driving “Vehicle-as-a -Service” (VaaS) platform. GM’s efforts are seeming to pay off as the respected research firm, Navigant, recently ranked it and Ford at the top of the self-driving leaderboard.
Companies like Delphi, Intel, and Nvidia, are hoping to sell their driverless systems to automakers in what is expected to be a market of around $100 billion within the next couple of years. BMW last week unveiled 40 BMW 7-series equipped with Intel’s driverless technology. The test, using the specially converted autonomous 7-Series is part of the German company’s project that will see 155 million test miles driven. Nvidia, an early front-runner in the self-driving tech space lat week, announced that Toyota would use its autonomous microchip built on Nvidia’s artificial intelligence platform called Drive PX. Both Daimler and Audi have already partnered with Nvidia on its Drive PX system.
Precursors to larger ride sharing and hailing services would be regulation, computing infrastructure, and connectivity. Governments would have to enact regulation to allow driverless cars while processing power and data centers need to be increased many fold to accommodate driverless technology. So also is 5G connection a requirement, daily use of an average self-driving car would be four terabytes of data.
In February we provided a summary of the disengagement reportsby companies doing public testing on Californias’ roads. Only 10 of the permitted 20 companies filed reports, this number would definitely increase in 2017 judging from all the pilots announced recently. The pilot programs currently in action are mostly for level three and four autonomy and are expected to be commercially available from 2020 onwards. Even though it is expected that the Tesla 2018 models would have level five compliant hardware installed full autonomy is only expected in the latter half of the next decade.
The video by BMW below provides a short overview of the different autonomous driving levels.
By unpacking press statements from the world’s top luxury carmakers, BMW and Daimler, over the last eight months it is clear that the Daimler EV strategy will trump that of BMW over the next decade. Up to now, BMW has led the race between the two companies in the EV sector, but the German automaker is failing to capitalize on its position. BMW was first to market with a pure electric vehicle, the BMW i3, which success even surprised itself. This week BMW released its sales data for the first quarter 2017, showing that EVs now constitute 3% of its total sales as EV sales jumped 50%. The Chairman of the Board, Mr. Harald Kruger was quoted saying “We are therefore well on course to delivering more than 100,000 electrified vehicles for the first time in 2017”. The news from the top seems very bullish on face-value but therein lies the problem. BMWs management has been flip-flopping on finding a consensus view on where they see electric vehicles in the future. This week’s news from BMW is in stark contrast from news only six months earlier when the Board grappled with if it should pursue EVs at all.
In September 2016Reuters reported that the executive of BMW would not attend the 2016 Paris Auto Show as it grappled with its electric car strategy. At the time the company lost momentum against Mercedes and VWwho is chasing Tesla. The lack of momentum caused the head of the BMW i8 project to jump ship to Future Mobility, taking most of the core team with him. The executive team remained split on the future of electric vehicles and investing in what is initially a loss making exercise. The top executive team traditionally attend the Paris Auto Show, which is one of the most prestigious events in the industry, highlighting the significance of the board’s action.
The pro-EV block prevailed but despite BMWreaffirming its strategy to pursue the development of electric vehicles the company remained downbeat on the sector. BMW’s Chief Financial Officer, Frederick Eichner, was quoted by Bloomberg saying “We’ve learned that people aren’t prepared to pay a higher price for an electric vehicle. I don’t see some kind of disruptive element coming from electric cars that would prompt sales to go up quickly in the next five to six years.” So its seems that BMW changed its wait-and-see approach to a go-it-slow approach and remained cautious when it came to investing aggressively in the new technology. Where at first the company was a leader in developing the new proprietary technology it now joined most of the other laggards in producing PHEV variants of existing models, with no clarity on when BEV models will be available and how many.
In early March 2017, Mr. Harald Krüger was quoted by Reuters as saying “The fully electric drivetrain will be integrated into our core brands. To achieve this, we are now gearing our architectures toward combustion engines and pure battery electric drivetrains,” as the company plans to include EV manufacturing in its mass production line. Currently, the company’s electric vehicles are assembled at its low-volume plant in Leipzig. BMW will also expand the capacity of itsPHEV drivetrain plant in Thailand and fund the cost of the investment in its electric vehicle infrastructure through a production increase in its profitable SUV segment. To ramp up production to meet expected demand for the new Mini Countryman PHEV the company is considering manufacturing facilities for the Miniin Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK. The company also announced that it would start producing its iNext autonomous brandat its Dingolfing plant form 2021. Other models expected from the German automaker is the i8 Roadster PHEV (2018), a BEV Mini(2019), and a BEV X3 (2020). BMW‘s long-term electric vehicle strategy is to have EV’s contribute to between 15% and 25% of its sales by 2025.
Daimler, on the other hand, had the foresight at the start of the cycle to be an early investor in Tesla. The company invested $50 million in the Series E round in May 2009, and have been hailed by Elon Musk for saving the company from bankruptcy in the early years. Unfortunately, Daimler failed to follow the same daring approach it invested in in its own business model and fell behind BMW and Tesla.
Daimler’s passive stance changed in July 2016 when its CEO, Dieter Zetsche acknowledged the technology’s importance and expected an increase in EVs market share of the total vehicle market. The German automaker shifted its strategy to accelerate its efforts to stay abreast of its competitors, Teslaand BMW‘s push to ramp up production in the luxury electric vehicle segment. Within a short space of time, the company announced a massive $11Bln investment to support its electric vehicle strategy up to 2025, unveiled its new all-electric car brand, the EQ (Electric Intelligence) and unveiled a fully electric semi-truck. The EQ brand will develop a host of EV related services and products, not just cars, such as charging stations and battery packs. The first vehicle to come from the brand is targeted at the highly popular SUV segment, a clever move to differentiate the brand in this hotly contested sector. The EQ SUV is said to have a battery capacity of 70kWh providing a range of over 250miles powering two electric motors providing 300kW of power. The production version is expected to be launched in 2018.
In early April 2017Daimlerannounced that it would accelerate its $11 billion investment in electric vehicles by bringing it forward with three years from 2025, to 2022. Reuters reported that the automaker’s aggressive stance are the result of it not being able to cut fleet emissions of 123gm CO2/km from 2015 to 2016 in Europe. Europe has set a very stringent target of 95gm CO2/km by 2020. Daimler’s own target for 2020 is 100gm CO2. The German automaker cites the popularity of SUV’s as the reason for it not cutting its emissions for the first time since 2007. Daimler’s success in the SUV segment helped it to regain its dominance over archrival BMW for the first time since 2005.
In May 2017 Automotive News interviewed Mercedes-Benz head of production and supply chain management, Markus Schaefer. When asked how the company is preparing to assemble the EQ brand Mr. Schaefer responded – “We believe the EQ family will represent 15 to 25 percent of our sales in 2025, but at the end of the day, no one can say with certainty how high the share will be. Therefore, we need maximum flexibility, meaning we will integrate the EQ models into the same assembly line as the combustion engine models they will potentially replace. Preparations are on schedule, so our plants should be capable of operating at stable output levels whatever the EV take rates may be. But in order to facilitate this greater flexibility, we also had to adapt our manufacturing.” The capacity to mass produce EVs efficiently through the full-flex plant manufacturing strategy is set to help the company recover the massive investment it will make to get ahead in the EV sector.
Daimler is also investing heavily in charging infrastructure in Europe to facilitate the adoption of electric vehicles. The final proof of Daimler’s strategy will be the early release of a full electric SUV. 2018 is certainly going to be an exciting year for the electric vehicle market.
Note to data: The BMW i3 is listed as a BEV but includes sales for the BMW i3REx, a range-extended vehicle, a PHEV.
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It was just a matter of time for the newly formed partnership, barely five months old, between LeEco and Aston Martin hit the rocks, creating a roadblock for the Aston Martin EV strategy. Although none of the two companies officially announced the breakup of the Joint Venture to develop electric vehicle technology, China Money Network recently reported the suspension of the partnership by the British luxury carmaker.
The terms of the JV was for LeEco to help with the development of low emission vehicle technologies and deliver a concept car within two years. The partnership was funded by China Equity and the Chinese President oversaw the signing of the agreement. It was expected that the concept car will produce more than 1,000hp. The partnership also extended to the Rapid E 2018 model which is expected late 2017 and would have incorporated the latest LeTv Internet of the Vehicle (IOV) system. It is uncertain how the breakdown in the partnership will impact on the release of the performance saloon.
Recently we reported that LeEco, the Chinese equivalent of Netflix and parent company of two EV start-ups, Faraday Future in the USA and LeSee in China, was forced to sell its Silicon Valley property, earmarked for its US headquarters. The sale, reported by Reuters, to Chinese property developer, Genzon Group, will provide the company with $260 million much-needed cash.
Both EV start-ups are known for making bold statements and big ticket announcements just to be followed by press reports of cash flow and funding problems. The announcement comes at a time when Faraday Future is battling to break ground on its plant in Northern Los Angeles. The company could not even pay the $21 million deposit to Aecon despite being offered $300 million by the local authorities for building the assembly plant there.
The 13-year-old LeEco is financially pressed on all fronts and founder, Jia Yeutling, was quoted by insiders referring to the cash flow problem as a “big company disease.” Rumors have also been flying that it was exciting its India operations and shares in its flagship unit, Leshi Internet Information and Technology Corp Beijing lost 25% of its value in five months. LeEco, which products include consumer electronics and cellphones, such as the LePro phone were able to raise $2.2 billion from Sunac China Holdings, a property developer. The funds are however not earmarked forLeEco‘s electric car division. Faraday Future is said to hold the patents to the technology, but recent reports state that the technology is in fact held by a separate company in the Cayman Islands, creating insecurity for investors and borrowers.
One might assume that an icon such as Aston Martin also took the reputational risk in consideration when entering into a partnership with an unproven start-up, but it seems Chinese cash was the deciding factor. The partnership was concluded at a time when a number of partnerships and equity transactions between British car makers and Chinese companies were entered into. Other transactions included investments by Geely in the London Taxi Company’s EV plant at Ansy, and Shanghai-listed Far East Smarter Energy Group investing in UK-based Detroit Electricfor the manufacturing of the SP:01 EV. The transactions strengthen both the UK and Chinese positions in the electric vehicle market and created over 1,400 UK jobs.
We look forward to the official announcement by Aston Martin on the state of the partnership and how it will impact the release of the long-awaited RapidE. Aston Martin as recent as December stated that LeEco’s financial woes would not impact the JV or the release of the RapidE.
Navigant Research ranks the autonomous vehicle sector on strategy and ability to execute
Navigant Research placed Ford and GMat the top of its autonomous driving leaderboard, surprisingly far above Waymo (7th), the pioneer of autonomous driving. Waymo was only listed as a contender, and Tesla who has already clocked over 300 million miles in Autopilot (Level 2 Autonomy) did not make the Top 10 list. Waymo, not aiming to develop a car, but rather focusing on autonomous technology has partnered with Chrysler and Ford on testing autonomous technology.Making Navigant’s findings even more surprising to us is that
Making Navigant’s findings even more surprising to us is that Waymo performed exceptionally well compared to other automakers on the list when comparing across all permit holders allowed to test autonomous tech on Californias public roads. According to CA DMV regulations, each permit holder must annually file a disengagement report, reflecting the number of events where a driver essentially has to take over from the vehicle’s autonomous mode to either prevent a traffic incident or where the system fails. Waymo posted a record 0.2 disengagements per 1,000 miles in its 2016. For a breakdown of each permit holders testing in California read our recent blog providing detailed analysis. The table below shows a summary of all the permit holders in the CA DMV program’s disengagements per 1,000 miles.
Navigant’s criteria are based on the following ten factors:
vision;
go-to-market strategy;
partners;
production strategy;
technology;
sales;
marketing and distribution;
product capability;
product quality and reliability;
product portfolio and staying power.
The Top Ten Self-driving companies on Navigant’s list is:
Despite Tesla aiming to have a market ready Level 5 autonomous product by the end of the year, it is only listed as a contender. Tesla is criticized by some, for being too aggressive, using its customers as guinea pigs for its AutoPilot software.
Not surprising though is that Uber features on the bottom end of the list, the controversial ride-hailing company has been in the news lately for losing its right to test in San Francisco, being sued by Waymo and a crash in Tempe, Arizona, temporarily halting its pilot program.
The Czech automaker today gave a further glimpse into its Vision E Concept, the platform it intends to use for its electric vehicle strategy available for production in 2020. The automaker released details and artist impressions of the Skoda Vision E’s futuristic interior, called “Simply Clever.”
The Vision E’s interior sports four elevated shell-shaped chairs with the ability to electronically rotate up to 20 degrees. The cabin is spacious and modern with no middle tunnel, due to its battery powered drive train. The cockpit has various screens for the driver and passengers to operate the functions and services of Skoda Connect. Each occupant can charge his or her smartphone and connect individually to the entertainment system of the electric vehicle. Ten lighting variations provide ambient lighting through strips in the door and below the dashboard.
Access is gained through electronically operated counter-opening doors, very much like the BMW i3. From wattEV2Buy’s experience test driving the BMW i3, counter opening doors looks cool but is very impractical. Hopefully, the rotating chairs will make access easier, but it does not solve getting in the car in a parking bay, especially if it’s the driver and rear passenger. The Skoda Vision E also sports ample storage in its boot.
Skoda’s CEO, Bernhard Maier, announced at the unveiling that the company’s aim is to have electric vehicles as 25% of its model lineup by 2025. The Vision E will officially be unveiled at the Shanghai Auto Show, to be held from 19 to 28 April.
Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) shares broke through its $280 resistance level on record sales for the first quarter 2017, leading investors to re-evaluate their outlook for the company. The results showed that Tesla could deliver above market expectations. The sentiment is supported by a decrease of vehicles in shipment, of around 1,800 units. Investors are now reconsidering the poor market guidance for the company to deliver on its Tesla Model 3promises. The Q1 sales of 25,418 units show a growth of 12% on the previous quarter, which is a massive 69% on year-on-year basis. The Tesla Model X was the star, showing around 22% growth at 11,550 units, while the Model S sales grew by nearly 6%.
Today’s intraday share movement makes Tesla’s market value more than Ford (NYSE: F) and sees it gaining on General Motors (NYSE: GM), officially making it the number two in the sector. The electric vehicle manufacturer, which some still sees as a start-up, intraday market capitalization stood at around $47.95 billion, while Ford’s value dropped to $44.91 billion, on the back of a share price that was down 5%, caused by a decrease in March sales of 7%. GM shares also suffered a sell-off of around 4% on a marginal growth of just over 1%, bringing the companies market cap well within reach of Tesla at $50.78 billion.
Both GM and Ford have missed the opportunity in electric vehicles. The automakers recentlywrote to President Donald Trump, in an attack on EV’s, through the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, asking him to relax emission targets as they did not see consumer demand for electric vehicles justify such stringent EPA standards. Maybe investors are taking a cue from Hyundai’s shareholders, who revolted, resulting in the company changing its electric vehicle strategy in 2016.
The strong resistance of $280 which held since September 2014 saw the stock retreat after creating a double top formation at the level in July 2015. After testing the resistance for the second time, Tesla’s shares retreated to a low of $151 in Feb 2016. The first count on the breakout of the channel, which broke in January at $230, can see Tesla’s shares trade at around $320 in the near future. If all else remain equal, it will equate to a market cap of $52,2 billion, well above that of GM.
GM buys OSVehicle in rush for electric car technology
Today GM acquired its second Y Incubator company, the Italian based OSVehicle, for $1.1 billion in a bid to develop a self-driving “Vehicle-as-a -Service” (VaaS).
OSVehicle provides an open-source platform to hobbyists and other start-ups. Customers can have a full EV platform, the Tabby EVO, shipped between $12,500 and $19,500. OSVehicle claim start-ups can save $2 million and 3-years in Research and Development by going the open-source route. The open-source platform enables for larger disruption in mobility options using electric vehicles. Imagine adding George Hotz’s self-driving car kit which he plans to market through his company comma.aiat a price of $1,000, and you can build your own “ai-chauffeur” driven zero emission vehicle.
GM aims to use OSVehicle to develop its EDIT modular self-driving car based on the Chevy Bolt M1 platform. The decision was influenced by the ability of modular platforms to extend the lifespan of heavy use vehicles, such as ride sharing and hailing applications. OSVehicle‘s Yuki and Tin Hang Liu claim that through the use of modular architecture, car fleets can last ten times longer by enabling seamless hardware upgrades of self-driving and connected car technologies.
The current rush for electric car technology, autonomous vehicle technology, and mobility solutions has created some billion dollar transactions as automakers try and gain an edge over competitors. GM’s other recent investments include a strategic move into “Mobility as a Service” by investing $500 million into Uber competitor Lyft and autonomous vehicle company, Cruise Automation. GM also launched its own car sharing service, Maven.
Below are a few of the projects already developed on OSVehicle DIY electric vehicle platform. Please comment on what applications you would include in your own electric vehicle.
Uber’s self-driving pilot program may be halted in May due to a court order. According to a Reuters report, the Judge in the Waymo Uber court case warned the car-hailing company that should his director plead the 5th Amendment, and not testify for fear of incriminating himself; he might just grant the injunction sought by Google’s self-driving company, Waymo.
The case against Uber was brought before the San Francisco District Court in February. Waymo claims that its former employee, Anthony Levandowski, downloaded 14,000 files related the Google autonomous vehicle program before leaving to join Otto, an autonomous vehicle company acquired by Uber in 2016. Otto, using Level 4 autonomy equipped semi, successfully delivered a load of 50,000 beers on a 2-hour journey to Colorado Springs in October 2016.
Judge William Alsup warned Uber’s legal team in a closed hearing this week that unless Uber can prove they have not used any of Waymo’s technology associated with the files, that he would like to hear Mr. Anthony Levandowski version. The Judge went further, saying “I’m sorry that Mr. Levandowski has got his — got himself in a fix. That’s what happens, I guess, when you download 14,000 documents and take them, if he did. But I don’t hear anybody denying that.”
Uber has yet not responded to Waymo’s claims and is trying to push for arbitration, where Mr. Levandowski can testify in a closed hearing without fear of being criminally charged.
Uber last week temporarily groundedits autonomous vehicle pilot project after a collision caused by another vehicle. The company lifted the grounding on Tuesday. The hearing, set for May 3, could lead to a longer injunction of Uber’s self-driving program, wich would not add to alleviate the company’s tarnished public image. Should Uber be handed an injunction, it does not stop them from testing in other countries.
In other Uber electric vehicle-related news, the ride-haling company had to withdraw from Denmarkafter the introduction of a new law making it difficult for the company to operate its business model. And in the UK the company announced that it would expand it’s existing electric vehicle fleet from 20 Nissan Leaf and 30 BYD e6‘s to 150 cars in the City of London. The company will adapt its app and install fast chargers to assist the drivers of the EV’s.
Hyundai admits electric vehicles are an imperative. The South Korean automaker, Hyundai Motors (005380.KS) strategy has been focused on Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles until investor pressure forced the company to change in 2016. The company, which also owns KIA Motors (000270.KS), announced at the Los Angeles Auto Show in 2016 that it will change course to electric vehicles. Hyundai-Kia’s head of its green car efforts, situated in the city of Yongin, Mr. Lee Ki-Sang, shed light on the strategy change to electric vehicles during an interview ahead of the 2017 Seoul Motor Show.
In Los Angeles, the company said that it planned to have 14 new alternative vehicles in the US by 2020. The planned product mix include’s four plug-in hybrids, four electric and one hydrogen fuel cell model. Today Mr. Lee shed some more light on the company’s plans, indicating that the first fully electric vehicle planned for next year would be a small SUV. According to Mr. Lee, the SUV would have a range of 185 miles (300km). Although the company is developing its own dedicated platform, it can’t say when it would be ready. The platform is modeled after that of Tesla, with the batteries in the floor, allowing for more battery capacity and cabin space. It is clear from the announcement that the company is aggressively trying to catch up on lost ground.
The Korean automaker has been criticized by investors and analysts for not acting on electric vehicles sooner, pressuring the company to change its strategy. Investment analyst expects the company to lose money initially on the shift to EV’s, but that should they not act they would be left behind. An analyst at Hi Investment Securities went further to say that they must target long range electric vehicles between 190 miles and 400 miles to be relevant at all.
Hyundai now expects the EV market to be around 10% of the global fleet by 2025, at which point Fuel Cell EV’s will take off. Hyundai’s luxury brand, Genesis also announced today that it would introduce a PHEV by 2019 and BEV by 2021.
The Hyundai-Kia alliance is also planning Chinese versions of its electric vehicles, and for the purpose, its is in the process of sourcing batteries from China, since Korean suppliers LG-Chem and Samsung are excluded from subsidies in China from 2016. The company is speaking to the likes of Contemporary Amperex Technology Ltd (CATL) and others for battery supply.
Skoda announces Electric Vehicle strategy. The Volkswagen company, headquartered in the Czech Republic, will release its electromobility strategy, called the Vision E Concept at the Shanghai Motor Show in April 2017. Skoda is the last if the Volkswagen Group of companies to unveil its electric vehicle strategy. The company benefits from research and development of the Volkswagen Group and will build its electric vehicles on the German automakers MEB Platform.
Skoda’s strategy will kick-off with a plug-in hybrid vehicle in 2019, the ŠKODA SUPERB PHEV. The company will produce five fully electric vehicles by 2025. The Skoda Vision E will include self-driving technology and be classified as a Level 3 Autonomous vehicle, inline with the company’s expectation that 15% of all vehicle to be self-driving by 2030.
The specifications for the Vision E Concept, a five-door SUV are as follows:
The new strategy is a deviation from the strategy announced at the Geneva Motor Show in 2016, named the Vision S. The Vision S was based on a PHEV version of the SKODA KODIAQ, a six-passenger SUV with the full-electric version expected in 2020.
Tencent acquires a significant stake in Tesla. The large Chinese Internet company, with holdings in various electric vehicle companies, have acquired a significant stake in Tesla. The acquisition was made by accumulating stock over time. Tesla (TSLA) shares traded higher by around 2.2% at $276.25 in after-hour trades, bringing it closer again to the $280 all-time high resistance level.
Tencent is owned by the world’s 46th richest person, Ma Huateng of China, also know as Pony Ma. Tencent, which applications include the popular WeChat app, similar to WhatsApp, aims to leverage its tech experience in a world where connectivity and the Internet of Vehicles will drive the auto industry. The development of electric vehicle technology provides a perfect platform for tech and vehicles to meet. To this end, Tencent created a company Future Mobilityand targeted an autonomous vehicle by 2020. Tencent is also a shareholder in NextEV. NextEV’s NIO brand unveiled its autonomous vision a couple of weeks back at an event in Austin Texas.
Interestingly enough, the result is that a South African company, Naspers, is now an indirect shareholder in Tesla, a company founded by native South African, Elon Musk. Naspers currently holds around a 34% shareholding in Tencent; the company made its investment in Tencent when it was a little-known start-up in 2001. At the time Naspers invested $34m for 46.5% in Tencent.
Uber Technologies Inc [UBER.UL] this weekend suspended its testing of self-driving car technology after a non-fatal crash in Tempe, Arizona. The crash, caused by another vehicle when the driver “failed to yield” to Uber’s Volvowhile making a turn. Two engineers were passengers in the front cockpit of the driverless vehicle. Uber decided to suspend the testing of its self-driving program in Arizona and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The company already lost its license to test its autonomous vehicles in San Francisco in February, where the regulators came in possession of footage showing an Uber pilot vehicle running a red light, barely missing a pedestrian. In the incident, the company claimed that it was a driver error. The Californian DMV offered Uber assistance and a clear road to permitting the company and State could not agree on workable rules around Uber’s demand for its technology to be classified as SAE Level 3 automation.
Uber is Piloting retrofitted VolvoXC90 SUV’s and Ford Focusvehicles and recently announced a cooperation agreement with Daimler, where the German automaker will introduce and operate self-driving cars on the Uber network. Uber abandoned efforts to build its own vehicle early on, rather focusing on partnering and acquiring technologies to achieve its goal of a self-driving fleet for its network. Uber acquired autonomous trucking company Otto in 2016 and made a successful delivery of a consignment of beer before being blocked by the CaliforniaDMV. Otto’s success is unfortunately mired in controversy as Google’s Waymo is suing the company for stealing its technology.
One should think that there was no real need for a drastic move such as suspending the pilot program? Tesla did not suspend its autopilot software when a driver was killed in May 2016. Accidents by driver neglect are the kind of accidents that few drivers can escape and will continue happening while humans are in control of vehicles. The answer rather lies in Uber trying to clean up its act and restore its image. The company has been suffering from a stream of negative publicity lately, with its Chairman, Jeff Jones, a marketing expert hired to improve the company’s image resigned after only 7-months, confirming the rot at the company.
We hope that Uber get its act together and quickly resume its testing, after taking the necessary safety precautions, so humanity can benefit from safer transport in the near future.
A self-driven Volvo SUV owned and operated by Uber Technologies Inc. is flipped on its side after a collision in Tempe, Arizona, U.S. on March 24, 2017. Courtesy FRESCO NEWS/Mark Beach/Handout via REUTERS
NextEV gets support for its autonomous car the NIO EVE in the same week in which a funding crisis ankle taped another aspirational EV startup from China, Faraday Future, backed by a Chinese internet company, LeEco. Baidu Inc, the Chinese search engine this week led an investment round estimated at $600 million into NextEV. NextEV, a global startup as it calls itself, with offices in China, Germany, UK and the USA launched it’s auto brand NIO, in December 2016 in London. NextEV is also one of the first participants of the Formula E franchise held in various cities around the world to promote electric vehicles. NextEV has its roots in racing, founded in 2004 by the Chinese Minister of Sports with the intent to be a Chinese contender in A1 Grand Prix. The NextEV TCR team eventually ended up being one of the first teams to compete in Formula E, winning the driver’s title in the first season but came last in the second season. The exposure nonetheless is a good testing ground for technologies, gaining experience and marketing. NextEV’s Formula E team lies at a respectable fourth position in the overall team standings after the third round in the third season, held in Buenos Aires Argentina during February 2017.
NIO unveiled its autonomous vision, to be released in the USA in 2020, the NIO EVE, at a world premiere event during the SXSW 2017 in Austin Texas. TheNIO EVEis a Level 4 Automated electric vehicle for the US market, anticipated for release in 2020. NextEV partnered with MobilEye, recently acquired by Intel, NVIDIA and NXP Semiconductors to develop its autonomous vehicle. Along with the release of the NIO EVE, U.S. CEO Padmasree Warrior showed a video of the NIO EP9 completing the first historical feat of racing around the America‘s Track in Austin Texas without a driver, reaching a top speed of 160mph. The vehicle also broke a lap record with a driver.
Baidu, looking for new growth areas, created a $3 billion investment fund, Baidu Capital, found the fast-growing electric vehicle market attractive at a time when the vehicle and the internet are moving closer to each other. NextEV raised $500 million in 2016 from investors such as Tencent, who is also invested in Future Mobility, Hillhouse Capital, who also invested in UBER, Sequoia Capital and Joy Capital.
Judging from the interest in NextEV‘s offering from investors consumers can certainly look forward to being wowed by NextEV while it pushes the boundaries, not being tied to the red tape associated with most Big Auto companies.
Read more on the Chinese internet billionaires investing in the fast-growing electric vehicle market at the following link.
Faraday Future‘s wheels are coming off due to what its founder, Jia Yeutling, is calling a “big company disease,” being a cash crunch. LeEco, the Chinese equivalent of Netflix and parent company of two EV start-ups, Faraday Future in the USA and LeSee in China, is forced to sell its Silicon Valley property, earmarked for its US headquarters. The sale, reported by Reuters, to Chinese property developer, Genzon Group, will provide the company with $260 million much-needed cash.
LeEco, now known for overpromising and massively under delivering, claimed that its premium car, the Faraday Future FF91, is a “Tesla Killer.” LeEco unveiled the FF91 “Tesla Killer” at the 2017 CES in Las Vegas along with the LeSee concept electric vehicle. While the LeSee received acclaim the launch of the FF91, on the other hand, was a real doozie. Faraday Future quickly published a highly edited version of the launch on its website, but it was too late as real events quickly went viral. See the video at this link. LeEco has also partnered with Aston Martin on the RapidE, where it will help with the development of the zero emission technology.
Faraday Future, a contradiction in terms, is scaling back all its operations in the USA, with the headcount rumored to have halved over the last couple of months. The production facility in North Las Vegas has been scaled back significantly, and although ground-breaking started late 2016, it has just remained that, as no production facilities have been erected. The company could not even pay the $21 million deposit to Aecon despite being offered $300 million by the local authorities for building the assembly plant there. The new phased construction is in line with the company’s reduced model lineup down from 7 models to 2.
The 13-year-old LeEco is financially pressed on all fronts. Rumors have also been flying that it was exciting its India operations and shares in its flagship unit, Leshi Internet Information and Technology Corp Beijing lost 25% of its value in five months. LeEco, which products include consumer electronics and cellphones, such as the LePro phone were able to raise $2.2 billion from Sunac China Holdings, a property developer. The funds are however not earmarked for LeEco‘s electric car division.
BMW is shedding some lite on its short-term electric vehicle strategy, according to Reuters, citing CEO Harald Krüger. The German automaker hinted that the Minicould be the BMW mass-market electric car, competing with the Tesla Model 3 and Chevrolet Bolt, as the company targets over 100,000 EV sales for 2017, up from 62,000 in 2016.
BMW is releasing the Mini brand’s first electric vehicle mid-2017. The Mini Cooper Countryman S E All4, available at dealers in Europe from 24 June 2017. Mini’s first attempt, the Mini E, was produced in a limited amount and only used for field trials in 2010.
Mr. Harald Krüger was quoted as saying “The fully electric drivetrain will be integrated into our core brands. To achieve this, we are now gearing our architectures toward combustion engines and pure battery electric drivetrains,” as the company plans to include EV manufacturing in its mass production line. Currently, the company’s electric vehicles are assembled at its low-volume plant in Leipzig. BMW will also expand the capacity of its PHEV drivetrain plant in Thailand and fund the cost of the investment in its electric vehicle infrastructure through a production increase in its profitable SUV segment. To ramp up production to meet expected demand the company is considering manufacturing facilities for the Mini in Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK.
BMW‘s long-term electric vehicle strategy is to have EV’s contribute to between 15% and 25% of its sales by 2025.
One of the few company’s being called a Tesla killer with a shot at it (however distant), the San Francisco-based Lucid Motors, today announced the pricing for its base model.
The base price for the Lucid Air will be $60,000 before Federal ($7,500) and State incentives, which compares extremely well with luxury ICE and PHEV vehicles such as Volvo, BMW, and Mercedes and delivers a superior performance being a fully electric vehicle. Some in the media billed the Lucid Air a Tesla Killer, much like Faraday Future also claimed, although FF’s claim seems very much like hot air then walking the talk. At least Lucid Motors management, beginnings, and the business plan seem much more grounded, and delivering an electric vehicle with a range of 240 miles below the Model S 60 which start at $68,000 for 218 miles seems like an aggressive shot across the bow. Lucid Air started off as Atieva, a developer of battery systems for electric vehicles.
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The features of the base model are listed as:
400 horsepower;
Rear Wheel Drive;
Autonomous Drive ready, although no indication of the ability itself;
32 cubic feet storage from two trunks;
12-Way front seats;
Multi-lens LED headlights;
Four screens, three with interactive touch surfaces;
5-seat configuration;
Ten advanced airbags;
Aluminum roof;
19-inch wheels;
Ten speaker audio system;
over the software updates, similar to what Tesla offers.
The Lucid Air will be available in a number of options, all the way to what was presented in its Alpha show car, allowing it to compete in the large luxury car segment. The complete package will cost north of $100,000 and although final options were not released the company provided a glimpse on some of them, being:
315 mile and 400-mile battery options;
All wheel drive twin motor configurations up to 1,000 horsepower;
Fully active suspension;
Glass canopy roof;
Rear executive seats with a 55 degrees recline;
22-way front seats with massaging, heating, ventilation and dynamic bolsters;
21-inch wheels;
29-speaker audio system;
expanded leather trim.
The first 255 cars of the line will be Launch Edition vehicles, priced at over $100,000 and will also have unique colors and badging, signifying their special nature.
It will take a lot to be a Tesla Killer in our viewpoint, but at least Lucid Air provides the consumer more options. No indication of a launch date has been provided, but interested customers can reserve a base model at $2,500 and the Launch Edition at $25,500 on the company’s website.
The barriers to entry into auto manufacturing became ever higher over the last 100 years before the disruption caused by technological advances in electric vehicles and self-driving technology. Most of the auto brands that were around at the turn of the century have been around for 50 years or longer; the only newcomers was a spate of Chinese brands backed by the government. For an individual to reach the top 50 position on the Forbes list from vehicle manufacturing was only possible if your parents left you a trust fund with a bunch of 100-year-old stock in a big brand. In fact, the only Forbes Top 50 billionaire from the auto sector was the German’s, Herbert and Johanna Quandt who owned nearly 50% of BMW and Georg Schaeffler (Number 39 on Forbes 2016 list) who inherited the automotive parts company, Schaeffler Group. After their passing of Johanna Quandt, the children, Susanne Klatten (Number 38) and her brother Stefan Quandt (Number 48), became the beneficiaries. Mrs. Klatten invested her fortune in pharmaceuticals, helping her to gain over her brother.
Come to the turn of the century and along came Elon Musk, risking it all on a technology that has been shunned for 100 years by big auto. Being a start-up in a market controlled by a couple of dinosaurs was not easy at first, Mr. Musk had to back himself in the first couple of rounds of fundraising for the electric vehicle company, Tesla. The table below shows that Elon Musk pretty much up until late 2008 lead fundraising and loan rounds. The risk paid off as Elon Musk became by far the richest person in the US auto sector and at the time of going to press Elon Musk jumped to the 83rd position, up from 94 in the official 2016 Forbes list of the world’s richest people.
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Other early billionaires in the technology include the savvy investor Warren Buffet and Vincent Bollore. Warren Buffet, the world’s 3rd richest individual through his Berkshire Hathaway, controlled company, Mid-American Energy Holdings in 2008 bought 10% in BYD, a Chinese battery company, now the world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer. The Investment at the time was $230m. Berkshire Hathaway is also a significant minority shareholder in GM.
Vincent Bollore, France’s 10th-richest person with an estimated personal fortune of $6 billion dollars, started manufacturing batteries in his company Bollore Blue Solutions. The firm, situated in Brittany province, who’s batteries are cheaper than lithium-ion cells used in other electric cars, allows it to hold down the cost of his small vehicles.
Suddenly investing in electric vehicles became sexy. Chinese billionaires, mostly from the technology sector, were the first to climb into the auto sector, some more successful than others. The Chinese electric vehicle boom is fuelled by government incentives targeting that 8% of all new vehicles should be EV’s by 2018.
The tech billionaire and founder of BitAuto, an online vehicle sales platform, William Li started the Shanghai-based NextEV. The company raised $500M of an expected $1Bln already, sporting shareholders such as Tencent, who is also invested in Future Mobility, Hillhouse Capital, who also invested in UBER, Sequoia Capital and Joy Capital. The company invested C¥3Bln in Nanjing High-Performance Motor Plant to produce 280,000 electric vehicles per year. NextEv also signed a partnership with one of the largest Chinese auto companies, JAC Auto which will see them share technology, manufacturing, supply chain, marketing, and capital.
Tencent mentioned above is owned by the world’s 46th richest person, Ma Huateng of China, also know as Pony Ma. Tencent, which applications include the popular WeChat app, aims to leverage its tech experience in a world where connectivity and the Internet of Vehicles will drive the auto industry. The development of electric vehicle technology provides a perfect platform for tech and vehicles to meet. To this end, Tencent created a company Future Mobility and targeted an autonomous vehicle by 2020.
The Chinese billionaire, Jia Yueting, founder of LeEco which owns LeTV, the Netflix of China invested in two electric vehicle companies, LeEco, which developed the acclaimed LeSee concept vehicle and Faraday Future, developer of the disastrous FF91, unveiled at the 2017 CES. Both businesses are known for making bold statements and big ticket announcements just to be followed by press reports of cash flow and funding problems.
The Chinese internet giant, Alibaba, owned and founded by Jack Ma who is 33rd on the 2016 Forbes list, invested $160M in a fund where it partnered with SAIC, one of the largest Auto manufacturers in the China to develop internet connected cars. The first car to come from the partnership is the Roewe OS RX5, where OS stand for Operating System and using SAIC’s luxury brand Roewe as a platform. The software runs on Alibaba’s YunOS operating system. Jack Ma unveiled the car in July 2016. The Alibaba Connected Car will have its own Internet ID, not needing WiFi or GPS services, enabling it to connect and identify drivers through their smartphones and wearables. The RX5 has four cameras providing it 360° vision and is voice controlled. The vehicle’s starting price is around $15,000 or C¥100,000.
Alibaba beat other carmakers and tech companies to the finish line with the 2016 release of the RX5. In 2015 Toyota invested $1 billion in artificial intelligence research, while Apple invested $1 billion in Chinese ride-hailing app, Didi Chixing. BMW went into partnership with technology firms Mobileye and Intel, providing the automaker with operating systems and driving assistance software while Kia and Google partnered around the search engine’s Android Auto operating system.
Robin Li, number 90 on Forbes List and owner of Chinese search engine Baidu, partnered with chipmaker Nvidia in September 2016 to develop a computing platform for self-driving cars. Baidu recently received approval from the Californian Department of Motor Vehicles to test autonomous vehicles, in Google‘s back yard. Baidu also partnered with BMW on creating an autonomous car.
Now that the floodgates are open, billionaires from around the world are looking to enter the electric vehicle and self-driving sectors. The world’s fourth richest man, Carlos Slim of Mexico,announced this early this year that he would back the development of a Mexican-produced electric vehicle through his company, Giant Motors in a joint venture with Grupo Bimbo, the world’s largest bread maker. The strategy plays off in an environment where many US based automakers are contemplating bringing production back to the USA amidst President Trumps America First policy environment. Mr. Slim said the electric vehicle would be designed specifically for Mexican conditions.
Bloomberg reported that the JSW Group’s owner and Chairman and India’s 19th richest man, Sajjan Jindal, announced in Davos, Switzerland his intention to enter the Indian Electric Vehicle market by 2020. The metals tycoon expects the Indian government, like many other governments, will promote EVs once it’s more affordable.
It is clear that some of these businessmen are purely opportunistic, targeting to profit from regulation and subsidies for the promotion of electric vehicles.The majority, however, leverages their passions to bring better and more advanced options to the consumer at a much faster pace than what big auto ever moved in the last 50 years.
Although not mutually inclusive to electric vehicles, self-driving cars, deployable on combustion vehicles also, will drive the second phase of disruption in the auto sector over the next ten years. Self-driving car’s poster child is Google, owned by the 12th and 13th richest individuals in the world, Larry Page, and Sergey Brin. The company started testing it’s quirky autonomous vehicle as far back as 2009. Google recently spun the project into a standalone brand, named Waymo, meaning “a new way forward.” The company aims to partner with vehicle manufacturers instead of developing its own car. The first of such efforts was the conversion of 100 Chrysler Pacifica’s Plug-in Hybrid vehicles. Google, in many’s eyes, has lost the lead to Tesla, who’s progression was much faster and already has active Level 2 autonomy available in its production vehicles.
It will be interesting to compare the Forbes list of wealthy individuals ten years from now to one at the start of the century; we expect much more fresh faces who made their money from disrupting the auto sector. As a footnote, the lesson learned time and time again by dinosaurs in an industry are that they become too big, arrogant and slow, creating opportunities for new hungry entrants.
The race for self-driving cars began in all earnest in 2015 with Tesla aggressively leading the pack at the end of 2016. Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, is of the opinion that current hardware is already sufficient to allow Level 5 automation (full automation) as set by SAE International, an engineering association. KPMG in its 2017 Global Automotive Executive Outlook found that 37% of auto executives rated the self-driving trend as extremely important. The initial front-runner for the technology, Google Auto (now Waymo) has changed strategy from developing a car to developing systems and rather partnering with automakers than building its own car. Other than Tesla, who develop and test on the go with incremental software upgrades. Google and most other contenders are developing solutions in closed environments while being permitted to test on public roads in States such as California, Michigan, and Illinois. By late 2016 a total of 20 companies has received permits from the California Department of Motor Vehicles (CA DMV).
According to the regulations, each permit holder must annually file a disengagement report, reflecting the number of events where a driver essentially has to take over from the vehicle’s autonomous mode to either prevent a traffic incident or where the system fails. These submissions allow the public who is interested what is happening in the automaker’s self-driving test some insights, outside from what the marketing departments feed the media. Although a total of 20 permits have been granted by the end of 2016, only ten companies have conducted public tests or filed reports for the period. Here follows a summary of the reports filed by the various companies for their testing on Califonia’s public roads for the period December 2015 to November 2016. For comparison purposes, we converted the result to indicate the amount of disengagements per 1,000 miles, a measurement used by Waymo in a recent post by its Head of Self-Driving Technology, Dmitri Dolgov.
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Comparing disengagement results per 1,000 miles above shows, bar Tesla’s customers who have clocked over 300 million miles on Autopilot (Level 2 Automation) as at November 2016, it is clear that Waymo is aggressively accelerating its learning and showing the results for it compared to the other brands with projects on Californian roads. One must, however, take into consideration that comparing the different disengagement reports is not truly comparing apples to apples. Ford’s testing, for instance, was only on the stretch of Interstate 10 between Los Angeles and Arizona. The companies also have different strategies. Tesla aims to have level 5 automation as soon as possible while companies such as Ford aims to have autonomous vehicles for ride-hailing and sharing services only from 2021 onwards, influencing the difficulty grade of testing. To further try and unravel each company’s testing program we delve deeper into their submitted reports below.
READ THE BLOG FOR A COMPLETE BREAKDOWN OF DISENGAMENTS REPORTS
The controversial LeEco announced the groundbreaking of its plant in the city of Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province China. LeEco, owned by the Chinese Internet entertainment company LeTV founded by Chinese businessman Jia Yueting, is entwined between Faraday Future and the LeSee electric vehiclemanufactured by LeEco. Both businesses are known for making bold statements and big ticket announcements just to be followed by press reports of cash flow and funding problems. The announcement comes at a time when Faraday Future is battling to break ground on its plant in Northern Los Angeles. The company could not even pay the $21 million deposit to Aecon despite being offered $300 million by the local authorities for building the assembly plant there.
Mr. Jia Yueting, struggling to keep all the balls in the air, missed the groundbreaking as he had to take over the day-to-day activities of Faraday Future in the US, just weeks prior to the unveiling of its first production vehicle. LeEco has also partnered with Aston Martin on the RapidE, where it will help with the development of the zero emission technology. Faraday Future is said to hold the patents to the electric vehicle technology, but recent reports state that the technology is in fact held by a separate company in the Cayman Islands, creating insecurity for investors and borrowers.
A guide to investing in lithium, nickel, and cobalt used for electric vehicles as it spurs another gold rush as mining companies scramble for “modern” resources such as lithium(white petroleum as its now aptly called), nickel, and cobalt.
Lithium’s properties include being the lightest metal on the Periodic Table which has the highest electrochemical potential of all metals. Lithium is a soft silvery metal that reacts immediately with water and air. Some analyst predicts that current lithium demand would rise from 16,500 to between 120,000 to 250,000 tons by 2025 to feed the 14 battery mega factories that are developed, mainly in China. Rising lithium prices in the short term are not seen as a threat to the electric vehicle sector, as most large battery manufacturers indicated that they had fixed forward prices when we asked them to comment. Lithium prices are set through direct negotiations, as no terminal or spot market exists for the commodity. Investors should be careful not to get to fixated on sentiment and remind themselves that lithium batteries have been around for some time for use in cell phones and other handheld devices. Batteries for these devices, up till now, make up nearly 90% of demand supplied by the likes of Samsung and LG Chem. Lithium is not a scares commodity, and production capacity should increase over the longer term to keep up with the growth in demand due to electric vehicles. Lithium mining is also not an expensive venture. Lithium carbonate is extracted through an evaporation process from a brine found in salt flats. A risk with lithium is that the biggest deposits are concentrated in South America, especially Bolivia, where a handful of mining companies can control prices.
Commodities that shows a bigger opportunity on the upside include nickel, copper, and cobalt. Analyst comments remained bullish on these commodities at the recent African Mining Indaba, held in Cape Town, South Africa. Although Africa also has lithium deposits, its mostly found in rock and more expensive to extract. These deposits are also better suited for the technical applications such as ceramic and glass industries, than chemical applications such as batteries. Reuters (February the 14th 2017) reports that investors are scrambling for physical stocks in cobalt, a key ingredient for electric vehicle batteries. By adding cobalt to the chemistry of lithium batteries, car manufacturers can gain range. Cobalt is a buy product of copper, where investors are exposed to larger risk and cost if they invest in mining companies, such as Anglo American, Glencore or BHP Billiton to gain exposure in cobalt. Therefore the only direct investment is to buy and stockpile physical cobalt, a process which has a high barrier of entry, excluding smaller investors. A further concern is that most of the world’s cobalt comes from the Eastern Congo, a war-torn region of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), close to Rwanda and Burundi, whose rebels also use the region as a springboard for causing trouble. The political environment in the DRC has deteriorated and will not improve soon as the country prepares for elections by the end the decade.
Investors trying to make a mint out of the electric vehicle boom should also keep a constant eye on how technology and battery chemistry change in this new and fast-moving sector, creating new opportunities for certain metals or bubbles for those becoming outdated. Let the history of investing in solar cells not repeat itself for battery investors.
Please leave a comment on your best or worst performing electric vehicle related stock pick below.
Ford debuted its next-generation Fusion Hybrid Autonomous development vehicle this week. The second generation of the vehicle sports more production ready controls and LiDar sensors on top of an improved computer hardware platform. Improved field of vision on the sensors allowed Ford to have only two sensors as opposed to four in the first generation. The second generation follows the first, introduced three years ago. The company aims to have an SAE Level 4-capable vehicle commercially available by 2021 for ride-hailing and sharing purposes. Ford will also expand its test fleet, currently operational only in Californiato its home state, Michigan. Watch the video of the assembly of Fords self-driving kit on the Ford Focus below.
In a bid to fast-track its electric vehicle strategy in an effort to curb pollution, the Chinese Government has called for comments on a proposal to invite foreign automakers to manufacture in the country. Current laws are designed to protect local manufacturers by forcing foreign companies to partner with the local automakers. The Chinese Government now propose to relax these conditions for new energy vehicles, providing the likes of Tesla an opportunity to produce locally and protecting their technology by not having to share it with a local partner.
Pictured is the Zinoro 1 EV, an example of how foreign manufacturers had to operate till now in China. The BWM Brilliance Joint Venture created the Zinoro premier car brand in 2013 to deepen the localization of BMW. Zinoro assembles its vehicles at the BMW Brilliance plant in Tiexi, near Shenyang in Liaoning Province north-east China. Many other manufacturers flooded the Chinese market with old technology to protect their intellectual property, hurting the consumer in the process, in a bid to just tow line in terms of government regulation.
This week Uber was forced to cancel its self-driving pilot in San Francisco, its hometown. Although regulators are in possession of footage showing an Uber pilot vehicle running a red light, barely missing a pedestrian, a claim the company contest that it was driver error and not the software, the ultimate decision was based on the company not following proper permitting procedures. The Californian DMV offered Uber assistance and a clear road to permitting the company and State could not agree on workable rules around Uber’s demand for its technology to be classified as SAE Level 3 automation. It is not the end of Uber’s efforts though as it is piloting retrofitted VolvoXC90 SUV’s and Ford Focus vehicles in Pittsburgh.
In May 2016 we reported on the Google (now Waymo) partnership to test self-driving car technology with 100 Chrysler Pacifica Minivans. The partnership completed the first vehicles within an impressive six-month period and revealed the vehicle this week. Waymo will start testing the vehicle on public roads within four cities coming 2017.
Following on the success of the Waymo (Google), Chrysler partnership automakers are flocking to the technology company to try and strike deals on self-driving technology. The latest company to announce that they are in talks with the IT giant is Honda. Honda announced that it approached Waymo to allow its vehicles to join testing in four US cities with Waymo’s self-driving technology. Honda targets commercial self-driving models by 2020. Other automaker’s that tried and failed to partner with Waymo includes Ford and GM.
For a list of other companies that are allowed to test the self-driving technology on Californian roads follow the link. The CEO of Waymo has also been invited as a member of the US Department of Transport Automation Committee. For a full list of all the members follow the link.
Post from watteEv2Buy Top EV News Weeks 51 of 2016
Tesla voted the consumers darling in the Consumer Reports Annual Owner Satisfaction Survey with 91% Tesla owners responded with a “Definitely yes” when asked if they will buy the brand again. Second with only 84% was Porsche. The bottom quartile included brands such as Jeep, Nissan, Fiat, and Volkswagen, which dropped eight places. The survey included over 300,000 vehicles. Can the States who is refusing Tesla’s direct selling model, naysayers, and auto dealers refusing to get behind electric vehicles please respond to this? For the complete list follow the link.
The biggest electric vehicle-related news of the past week was the much-anticipated launch of the Tesla 100kWh battery pack. The battery upgrade allows for increased range and speed, making the Model S P100D with Ludicrous mode the fastest production car on the road. The Model S upgrade has a range of 315mi, which is about 20 miles further than a Model S 90D, and in the Model X SUV, you will be able to travel 289mi. But range, in my opinion, is becoming less of an issue as charging infrastructure is built out, and more people realize that range anxiety is mostly an old wolves tale perpetuated by petrol heads. What is more important though is how quickly you can refill the batteries to continue on your journey? Tesla is certainly also the leader in the charging wars at the moment. Other vehicle manufacturers trying to catch up with Tesla, such as VW identified 15-minute charge for 300 miles as a key deliverable, but according to the company’s CEO, Matthias Müller the target date for this challenging task which would require 800 V charging technology, is only in 2025.
When it comes to comparing cars, however, the only matrix that matters in the eye of the general public is acceleration. Measuring acceleration from 0 – 60mph over a quarter mile is also the most common matrix used to compare electric vehicles with gas guzzlers, which gave rise to a whole cottage industry of YouTube marketers posting videos of a Tesla against one or other supercar, such as the Lamborghini Aventador.
With the new Tesla S P100D in Ludicrous mode, the vehicle is said to accelerate from 0 – 60mph in just 2.5 seconds. It begs the question if it’s even morally legal for a family sedan to be able to drive at that kind of speeds. To put the figure of 2.5 seconds in context, the Audi R8 e-tron‘s electric top speed is only 3.9 seconds and in combustion mode, for lack of better word, it is only 3.2 seconds and the BMW i8 in 4.4 seconds. The Tesla S P100D even beats its own kind on paper, the Rimac Concept One, billed the fastest electric car accelerates from 0 – 62mph in 2.6 seconds.
So, be prepared for a whole lot of Youtube videos showing the Tesla Models S, seating five adults, two children, and luggage and costing around $147,000 beating anything from a Ferrari to a Porsche Spyder costing close to $1M. The YouTube video I would most like to see is the Tesla against Atieva’sconverted Mercedes van, Edna.
Wynand Goosen
Contributor
Wynand studied his MBA in San Francisco where he was exposed to the fields of Service Science, Gamification and Renewables, which he combined to create wattEV2buy and the award winning web app Ekoguru. Wynand is a energy storage expert and has modeled, designed and presented various solutions utilizing lithium-ion and other electrochemical technologies. In his spare time Wynand is the author of a children’s book series and started a new project called “Career 180”.
In what is perhaps the worst kept secret in the electric car industry, Apple is looking to introduce its own electric car in the short to medium term. The company has dropped a number of subtle hints regarding its interest in electric vehicles but so far there has been no official recognition that the project even exists. Historically the company has played the public relations market to a tee but many now believe the company risks been ignored by the sector and EV enthusiasts unless it is a little more forthcoming with information.
Is Apple actually building an electric car?
Commonly known as “Project Titan” Apple will be making use of its infamous “i” trademark when it finally launches the iCar. There have been rumours and counter rumours, lies and mistruths and all because Apple is reluctant to let anybody into the secret which is widely known throughout the industry. Over the last few months there have been rumours of high-level management changes, a slippage in timescale for the project although again we have no official confirmation or denials. (more…)
Ever the one for grabbing the headlines, Elon Musk recently announced that Tesla is working on an electric truck and an electric bus. While you could argue that the technology used in the electric cars of today can be readily transferred to electric trucks and electric buses, is there an argument for suggesting that Tesla should just stick to electric cars for now? Is the introduction of new products going to put pressure on the company’s cash flow and quality of products?
Planning for the future
There is nothing wrong in planning for the future and there is no doubt that Tesla has some major plans for the months and years ahead. This comes at a time when the company is looking to roll out its new Tesla Model 3 and has faced some criticism from analysts regarding its autopilot system. In some ways we may be falling into the old trap of seeing Tesla as an automobile manufacturer when indeed it is a technology company. If we look at the likes of Apple, it has managed to transfer its technology to various platforms with the type of success many companies can only dream of. (more…)
In a move which is probably 10 years later than initially expected, Mercedes-Benz has announced plans to introduce an array of electric vehicles by 2020. This is a company which has been at the cutting edge of technology and luxury car travel but for some reason seems to have rejected electric vehicles until now. As the industry moves towards the mass market all of the major car manufacturers have been forced to reconsider their electric vehicle investment strategies with consumers becoming less concerned about range capacity and more concerned about long-term savings.
What can we expect from Mercedes-Benz?
While other automobile companies have launched electric vehicles under existing brand names it is believed that Mercedes will be introducing a sub brand focused wholly on electric vehicles. We should hear more about their plans at the Paris Motor Show in October but it does seem that finally Mercedes-Benz is getting serious. (more…)
This week saw final quarter figures from electric car giant Tesla with a tripling of full year losses to a staggering $889 million. Despite the fact that fourth-quarter figures were worse than expected shares in the company rose by 6% as ever confident entrepreneurs Elon Musk mapped out his plans for the future. However, while investors still seem to be enjoying a love affair with Tesla there are concerns that the company will need additional funding sooner rather than later.
Revenues increase
When you consider that annual revenues at Tesla increased by 27% to just over $4 billion this does not look like a company in trouble? Indeed the company is expected to hit its capacity of 1000 cars a week during 2016 which would lead to a significant increase in sales. With the new Tesla Model 3 creating a significant backlog of orders there are high hopes that sales will perhaps increase quicker than many are forecasting. There will be manufacturing challenges, no doubt issues and problems along the way, but if Tesla can convert the majority of current Tesla Model 3 orders into sales then this would strengthen the balance sheet somewhat. (more…)
The US automobile industry has in many ways been a law unto itself for decades now although young EV upstart Tesla Motors is determined to take on the might of the archaic US dealership system. While the original idea of dealership only automobile sales across the US was well-balanced, protecting consumers and independent dealerships from the might of the automobile giants, the Internet has changed the playing field. Many have tried and failed to overturn this ancient system but the outcome of a forthcoming Supreme Court battle in Utah could have significant ramifications for the future.
US dealership sales
Dealership associations up and down the US dominate and effectively dictate the way in which automobiles are sold. Restrictive direct sales laws in states such as Texas, Connecticut, Michigan, Indiana, Utah and others have not help the development of the electric car industry. The idea behind this system was to offer consumers a local contact point for issues, enquiries, spare parts, etc and effectively outlaw long-distance selling. However, the online sales arena has had an impact upon nearly every area of business life although the automobile industry is the last one to hold out! (more…)
Many people believe that the electric car market in its most basic form has gone past the point of no return and will be a major element of the automobile mass market going forward. This forward-thinking, forward-looking and technologically advanced industry is now looking towards the next development which for many will be autonomous vehicles. So, what is the general feeling about autonomous vehicles? Would you trust a car where you had little or no input?
Education, education, education
One of the main problems regarding the concept of autonomous vehicles is the fact that the general public have little or no experience in this particular area. How would it work? Is it really safe? Would there be a general override in the event of problems? (more…)
You may have noticed over the last few weeks that Tesla Motors has come in for a significant amount of criticism with regards to its autonomous driving system. A recent death obviously attracted the interest of the authorities, and while there were mitigating circumstances, it seems that some areas of the worldwide press are gunning for Tesla. Elon Musk has taken the electric car industry from not even a niche market to the mass market in less than a decade.
However, is it fair for Tesla Motors to carry the whole electric car industry?
Elon Musk has made enemies
Elon Musk is a multimillionaire who has no qualms about taking on the establishment and pushing back the envelope of new technology. Having initially made his money from the electronic payment system PayPal he now has his fingers in a number of pies but his investment in Tesla Motors has taken his public image to a different level. (more…)
wattEV2Buy’s BMW i3 Driving Report – The Good, the Bad and the Awesome.
Driving the BMW i3 REx was everything and more of what I expected from a luxury EV. It is slightly more challenging to write a test report for the BMW i3 because it can’t be directly compared to a combustion vehicle. For instance, if you evaluate for luxuries such as keyless entry you must take into consideration that it would use energy from the battery, and therefore most probably excluded from the design. One can pick up many little design tweaks’ to save weight and energy in the i3. I wrote a lot about the power, speed, and handling of the BMW i3 in my previous articles on the i3 and would therefore not delve into it in this BMW i3 Driving Report, but just focus on comforts and pains.
The Good
A spacious interior feeling, especially from the driver’s perspective. There is a meter or more’s space between the driver’s position and the windscreen, adding to the comfort of the vehicle.
A tight turning circle. The big front-cabin gives you the illusion of driving a long nosed sedan making the tight turning circle even more surprising.
The high driving position allows you to cope with the traffic on our SUV filled roads.
Run-flat tires, which for some is not a positive. On other BMW models, such as the 3 series you find steering with run-flats difficult, but not in the case of i3. I suspect the reason being the large wheels, which are deceptive as they are biscuit like. The large wheels add to the appealing design of the i3.
The Bad
Your selected drive setting needs to be reset on every new trip. It will have been much more efficient if the vehicle remembers your preferred drive setting.
Although the doors are mega cool, they are unpractical when two people need to enter the vehicle when you are parked next to another vehicle.
Since the vehicle is rear wheel drive it has limited boot space at the back and unlike the Tesla where you can fit a surfboard in the car the BMW i3 does not compensate by providing front storage. The small storage space that is available is used to store the charging cables.
Which brings me to the charging cables, which could be stored much neater through some clever design than having to try and fold it every time you recharge the car.
For all the technology in the vehicle, a rear camera would have been a worthy addition.
The position of the gear selector is very cool, placed as a lever on the steering column. The negative about it is that it is difficult to view your gear selection, which BMW could quite easily have presented on the main console.
The Awesome
The use of carbon much of the vehicle’s interior and structure.
Lots of visibility, the illusion is created that the roof floats on a wall of glass.
I can conclude that if I look past the cost of the vehicle and that much of the functionality related to operating an electric vehicle such as the fast charger and home charging system are not included in the price, I would seriously consider the BMW i3 REx as my next vehicle. The BMW Plug-In Hybrid EV is most properly the best first step for any person that would like to cross over to electric vehicles. For me the biggest plus is just the fact that BMW actually has a true EV product available in most markets, making it a member of a very elite bunch.
Wynand Goosen
Contributor
Wynand studied his MBA in San Francisco where he was exposed to the fields of Service Science, Gamification, and Renewables, which he combined to create wattEV2buy and the award winning web app Ekoguru. Wynand is an energy storage expert and has modeled, designed and presented various solutions utilizing lithium-ion and other electrochemical technologies. In his spare time, Wynand is the author of a children’s book series and started a new project called “Career 180”.
Changing your driving style to improve the range of your Electric Vehicle and other battery management tips.
As promised in the blog “My first date with an Electric Vehicle (EV)” I will give a few pointers on efficient driving and battery management to increase range and battery life.
There is nothing more satisfying than leaving home with a range of 150 miles (240km) available, arriving at work 50 minutes later and 35km further with the available range still being the same as when you left. How is this possible you might ask? Well, it is a combination of the engineering and adapting your driving style to suit the battery system. On the engineering front, the reactive braking system charges the battery when you take your foot off the accelerator or when braking. It takes about a day to get used to this style of driving, but once you have mastered the art of anticipating the stop-start traffic you can add (or save) about 15% on the range available from your battery (figures based on my own experience). Not only do you charge your battery during reactive breaking, the engine also serves as a brake instead of you having to use the braking system. All in all the past week’s experience proved to me that an EV is the perfect vehicle for someone who spends a lot of time in traffic.
Changing one’s driving style to suit the battery system is slightly more difficult for most of us. EV’s certainly punishes aggressive driving styles, you can literarily see your battery being drained when accelerating, which is a pity. There is nothing more fun than leaving all the gas-guzzlers in your wake, especially on the pull-away at a robot. To really understand the power of an EV at a pull-away you just have to Google for YouTube clips “Tesla vs. …“ to see how a whole host of supercars struggles against an EV. My favorite is the 2016 Tesla Model X against the 2017 Bentley Bentayga. Make sure to watch the clip to the end. The BMW ConnectedDrive app certainly helps you to change your habits by informing you how efficiently you have completed each trip. My best was 82% and, dare I say it, my worst was 16%.
Here are some pointers on how changing your driving style will increase your range and improve battery life.
Don’t cut corners. A recent studyby MIT and the University of Birmingham concluded that taking shortcuts is ineffective. Not only does it add 5 to 8 minutes in your own driving time it also adds to congestion which increases driving time during rush hour on average with 33% for all commuters.
Stick to the Highway. EV’s prefer smooth driving conditions. Stop-start driving, accelerating and driving up hills obviously take more out of your battery.
Use your car comforts sparingly. Heating and cooling drains battery power, I experienced a 15% decrease in range by just changing the heating from 21 °C to 28 °C. Higher end technically spec’d vehicles like the BMW i3 enables you to set your departure time, allowing the cabin to be heated while still on charge. Most EV’s also comes with different drive settings, whereby for instance the heating system could be disabled.
Temperature has an effect on battery discharge. Excessive heat or cold will influence battery life. Lithium-Ion batteries prefer charging and operating in cool temperatures. Normal lab testing and benchmarking is done at around 25 degrees Celsius (77 degrees Fahrenheit). Battery operation above or below the laboratory conditions will differ from the manufacturer’s stated range. Apart from changing your driving times away from the midday heat or morning cold, which is not practical in most cases, there is nothing you can do here except to take note that temperature will impact your range. Some EV’s include liquid cooling to protect the battery pack.
State of Charge (SOC) is a big influence on the battery’s life. A battery should not be charged to full and does not like to be at 100% SOC for longer than an hour or two. You will get the most out of your battery pack by keeping the SOC between 30% and 80%.
Although its sounds restrictive but in reality driving style has a bigger impact on a gas-guzzler from a financial perspective. Apart from the fuel cost, parts need to be serviced and replaced much more frequently than that of EV’s. In the end, it’s all just a mindset change of which you will reap the benefits of both the value of the battery and charging cost.
Wynand Goosen
Contributor
Wynand studied his MBA in San Francisco where he was exposed to the fields of Service Science, Gamification, and Renewables, which he combined to create wattEV2buy and the award winning web app Ekoguru. Wynand is an energy storage expert and has modeled, designed and presented various solutions utilizing lithium-ion and other electrochemical technologies. In his spare time, Wynand is the author of a children’s book series and started a new project called “Career 180”.
I am glad to report that range anxiety is only a short-term infliction for a novice EV driver. It took only two days to overcome the fear, which I realize know is born out of ignorance or a lack of experience. I feel so confident now that I am even prepared to take up a challenge to drive the 1400km to Johannesburg, which I estimate could be done in two days.
Granted, I am driving a BMW i3 REx, which can be classified as a plug-in hybrid (PHEV), giving you that added a sense of security. Over the last four days, I have only used the combustion motor on the first day to maintain the battery’s charge level, more our of fear than necessity. In fact, the American Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) devised a measurement, called a utility factor to compare how different PHEV’s are used. The utility factor is a projection of the share of miles that will be driven using electricity by an average driver in full electric or blended modes for PHEV’s. The Toyota Prius, for instance, has a utility factor of only 29%, while the Chevy Volt has a utility factor of 66%. The BMW i3 REx has a utility factor of 83%, supporting my experience.
Naysayers will try and detract potential or novice EV drivers by stating that an emerging market like South Africa does not have the necessary infrastructure of charging stations to support the adoption of EV’s. I was shocked that the sales manager of one of the large luxury brands used this argument on me today when I tried to find out what EV’s of PHEV’s they have locally. He argued his brand only supplied the best technological solutions. Really? Not a good claim to make if the only PHEV in the parking area was that of your competitor. I sometimes wonder why people, in general, depend on the word of a sales representative to make crucial buying decisions. This manager knew nothing about EV’s but he was prepared to take a position against it and most buyers would have based their decision purely on his knowledge. I digress. Granted, we do not have the fast charging network to support long distance traveling, but as mentioned in my post on range anxiety, only a few people need to travel more than 100km’s a day, at the least making the case for an EV as a second family vehicle. I found that there is no real need for charging stations to detract you from your buying decision. During this last week, I traveled 70km a day to and from work, leaving me with ample range to travel about three days in total before re-fueling. When home I plug the vehicle into my normal wall outlet overnight to recharge the +/- 10kWh I used. In any case, there is already some charging stations planned or being constructed in South Africa. A recent article estimated that globally charging stations would be a $12.6Bln industry by 2022, which would attract entrepreneurs or large corporates to provide the service locally.
Perceived high electricity rates impacting on charging cost is another favorite counter argument for EV’s. South Africans don’t like to hear that our electricity is cheap, however, compared to international standards it is still very cheap. Currently, the average base charge per kWh in Europe of €0.22 equates to R3.74 at the current exchange rate, compared to about R2.30 in Cape Town. Charging 10kWh would cost around R23, which is far less than the estimated R80 per day I spend on fuel for the same distance. WattEV2Buy provides a great toolto measure the cost of charging and comparing the cost for the different EVs and PHEV’s.
Another favorite argument by naysayers is that an EV’s battery pack only last for a couple of years and a replacing a pack are expensive. Most EV manufacturers currently provide an 8 year / 150000km warranty of the battery pack. Eight years is a very long time in the life of any technology. Added to which, if one take into consideration the huge increase in lithium-ion manufacturing capacity over the next three years, you can expect big price decreases in the kWh price of batteries. Just in the last year lithium-ion battery, cell cost decreased from above $600/kWh to $145/kWh negotiated for the Chevrolet Bolt battery pack from LG-Chem. Furthermore, a couple of business plans already exist for the second live of EV batteries as stationary solutions for grid or battery home systems. Both Nissanand BMW have already announced efforts to create second life products, giving some value to the battery pack when it needs replacement. Internationally efforts are also afoot to utilize EV batteries as part of the smart grid, providing EV users an income from their batteries for being a demand response asset when charging or even as backup power for one’s own home. There are even some manufacturers that lease the battery, so you would only buy the “shell” of the vehicle, Citroen and Renault provide this service. Some critique to this business model is that some drivers are skeptical that the vehicle could be disabled should they miss a payment.
I can honesty say that for me, apart from price there is no real argument for not switching to an EV or PHEV at the least. Elon Musk has done humanity a big favor by bringing EV adoption forward. It forced all the large manufacturers to review their EV strategies. Up to 2014, there was still widespread skepticism on the future of EV’s. If one review the vehicle manufacturers strategies in 2016 as summarized on wattEV2buy, it is clear that most have changed course for PHEV’s and EV’s. Now the majority of big auto brands have a planned product mix of around 50% PHEV’s and EV’s by 2020.
There is only limited time left to classify yourself as an early adopter, within two years the decision to buy an EV would be mainstream and promoted by the marketing departments of all automakers.
In the next blog we look at how to get the most out of your EV’s battery and extending range.
Wynand Goosen
Contributor
Wynand studied his MBA in San Francisco where he was exposed to the fields of Service Science, Gamification and Renewables, which he combined to create wattEV2buy and the award winning web app Ekoguru. Wynand is a energy storage expert and has modeled, designed and presented various solutions utilizing lithium-ion and other electrochemical technologies. In his spare time Wynand is the author of a children’s book series and started a new project called “Career 180”.
energy sector or investing in smart-grid related projects.
The terms of the JV was for LeEco to help with the development of low emission vehicle technologies and deliver a concept car within two years. The partnership was funded by China Equity and the Chinese President oversaw the signing of the agreement. It was expected that the concept car will produce more than 1,000hp. The partnership also extended to the Rapid E 2018 model which is expected late 2017 and would have incorporated the latest LeTv Internet of the Vehicle (IOV) system. It is uncertain how the breakdown in the partnership will impact on the release of the performance saloon.
through their smartphones and wearables. The RX5 has four cameras providing it 360° vision and is voice controlled. The vehicle’s starting price is around $15,000 or C¥100,000.
