Can we help the UK win the Electric Vehicle game?
How about a game? Here is the prize:
In the UK we're not on track to win the prize at the moment - but could we be? Are you a player? Would you like to be?
Over the last year I've met some brilliant people working in related fields, including in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), the Connected Places Catapult, Warwick University and Radix Big Tent. Between us I think we may be able to win the prize - and here is my suggestion (critical responses very welcome, and suggestions for improvement too!).
Partly it's about shifting our expectations of ownership and establishing new interface standards, but mainly it's an invitation to collaboration. If you're interested I'd love to collaborate with you in 2022.
Sic Transit
Electric vehicle adoption in the UK is accelerating almost as fast as a Tesla Plaid. Yet with vehicle prices out of reach of most drivers, electrification is still an expensive luxury. And as The Economist points out, the charging infrastructure lags far behind driver needs - and is beset with maintenance and accessibility issues that will take years as well as plenty of capital expenditure to resolve.
Path Dependence
The UK is on the path to being a client state in the EV era. The technology - and business models - on our roads are products of innovations in California and China, not Coventry. But it doesn't have to be like this. We might describe this as path dependence leading to an outcome optimised for a different environment. Is there a better path?
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Ludicrous Mode
The rugged musky individualism of the US EV industry has created the most valuable car company in the world, producing cars that few can afford and that are ludicrously over-specced and over-powered for most users. Strangely they compete to accelerate to speeds that incur an immediate prison sentence, but take many times longer to recharge than the conventional vehicles they aim to replace. They pursue the wrong objective function.
It doesn't have to be like this
Now picture a different, more collaborative EV market in which standardised batteries are exchanged when discharged. Batteries are owned by and leased from government or institutional investors, and stocked in modified filling stations that maintain a stock of charged batteries that can also be used as distributed grid storage.
Assault and Battery
EV batteries that are bespoke to individual models may provide superior technical performance per vehicle, but across the whole transport system standardisation can deliver greater efficiency both in procurement and utilisation as battery stocks can be used for distributed grid storage and supporting the national energy system beyond transport. In other words, this approach brings public benefits beyond a single industry (automotive) or sector (transport).
Face to interface
This is a coordination challenge - we need to foster collaboration between a wide range of stakeholders. While there is some technology innovation required in battery interface and mounting/dismounting technology, most of the innovation required is in business models. Value and costs are distributed differently, and there are clear convening and coordinating challenges - for government, academia, professional and standards bodies.
Standards for export
If the UK is able to resolve this coordination challenge, participating industries and companies will have the opportunity to export integrated technologies meeting standards that will accelerate both UK economic growth and national and international progress towards #NetZero. As a soft power superpower establishing a sustainable standards, Global Britain could win the Electric Vehicle game at home and abroad.
What do you think?
Business Development / Partnerships / Strategy Advisory
3 年Steve Unger what do you think?
Senior Managing Consultant at RealFoundations
3 年Really interesting point you raise Ben Brabyn about the current focus on performance vs. range. I'm guessing that a lot of this is about positioning EVs as a luxury / aspirational acquisition (there's probably a whole separate discussion about the relative merits of purchasing vs. leasing vs. hire-by-the hour modes of "ownership" - very front-of-mind as we signed up earlier today for a leased EV on a 3-year contract...), and then hoping for a trickle-down impact to adoption by the mass market. In the UK, we're probably still not past the "Sinclair C5" image at the arguably more sensible end of the market but which nevertheless failed to capture the public imagination. I too had heard (sorry - I don't have specifics) about a Chinese EV manufacturer who offered "charged-for-empty" battery swaps for their cars at strategically-placed service stations. Such a business model separates car "body" purchase from the perceived high risk of battery obsolescence / failure after a small number of years' use. Standardised batteries across the industry (presumably by vehicle class) would seem to be a no-brainer. Charging could presumably be made more electrically efficient via centralised high-capacity charging centres near to HV lines (or with their own renewable energy sources) than at the household end of the UK grid, having incurred a bunch of energy losses en route. This could also remove the need for costly at-home charging points, which at current prices would be more than 10% of your ￡5,000 vehicle. I look forward to this debate unfolding!
Business Development / Partnerships / Strategy Advisory
3 年Jonathan Carrier - I'd be really interested in your thoughts on this brief alternative perspective on the future of the EV and power industries...
NED at MHRA, visiting Professor, IGHI, Imperial College; Co-founder, Director, CMO, CSO & CIO, CLM Ltd; trustee Big Tent foundation; NHS Clinical Senate and practising p/t consultant physician
3 年Hi Ben, Really great article and interesting on a subject I've never thought about. When an octogenarian flew past me on a steep hill on her electric bike, it made me realise e-bikes are going to be transformative. Imagine if they were as ubiquitous as smart phones. More broadly I wonder if an area we could compete is data and AI. It seems so backward we still have primitive road pricing. The vehicle then becomes a commodity and it is the coordination of the flows where we innovate. Might be worth talking to https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/phil-blythe-4b28076 who spoke at a Big Tent event last Jan.
Getting kids active with XR fitness games
3 年Ben, great points. Couldn’t agree more. I believe there are already systems established for electric moped battery exchange in certain countries (SE Asia) that could provide an interesting template.