By all appearances, EV battery-swap specialist Better Place is in trouble, and as a result, any hope of EV battery swapping in large global markets are dashed. Last week, the company fired its second CEO after only 100 days in service, and announced that it will "wind down" operations in the U.S. and Australia, in order to focus its strategy and efforts in Denmark and Israel.
This leaves Better Place operating in two small markets, where as the company puts it, a "complete infrastructure is in place and commercial operations are fully underway." Yet, Better Place has spent about $500 million to date, and has a very small customer base: about 500 customers in Israel, and 500 customers in Denmark (200 of which have cars that don't allow batteries to be swapped).
The company also lacks the leadership and fundraising ability of Shai Agassi, its dynamic founder. He was let go in late September, after an apparent disagreement over company direction with Better Place's board of directors. Last week, Gigaom reported that Agassi still believes in the battery swap model. “I don’t have an issue with the model, I had a problem with the company,” Agassi told Gigaom on the sidelines of the Cleantech Investor Summit in Palm Springs, Calif.
Dan Cohen, who became the third CEO of Better Place last week, put a positive spin on the new strategy. "We are now focusing on realizing the full potential of what we have built," he said. "That means concentrating our resources and energy in the near term, on Denmark and Israel."
But in the U.S., the picture for EV swapping is bleak, in part becase hundreds of DC Quick Charge locations are finally being installed (many of them offering free electricity) in key American markets. The Quick Chargers cost a fraction of what battery swapping requires to install (around $3 million per swap station). And there is no sign of car companies stepping up to create EV models suited to battery swapping. With Better Place pulling out of the U.S., all the evidence points to the end of EV battery swapping as a viable solution at least for a few years, if not forever.
Battery swapping has always been a tall order. Standardization is very difficult, and ownership issues, never mind liability issues are also a challenge.
While battery swapping might seem sensible at first blush, I don't think it was going anywhere, I'm sorry to say. Fast charging is going to be just as quick, and only the plug has to be standardized.
Neil