Sono Motors revealed its production design for a passenger vehicle outfitted with a solar kit. It's slated to get the vehicles to customers starting next year.
“Basically every moving object can be equipped with that solar technology,” said Sono co-founder and CEO Jona Christians (right, with co-founder and CEO Laurin Hahn).
Solar-powered electric vehicles are one step closer to reality.
On Monday, solar EV company Sono Motors released the production design for its passenger car, dubbed the Sion, as well as for its “solar bus kit” designed for public transportation fleets across Europe.
“Basically every moving object can be equipped with that solar technology,” Sono co-founder and CEO Jona Christians told Protocol, including buses, trucks, trains and even ships.
The four-door Sion is a simple electric hatchback that’s compact but still spacious by European standards. What sets it apart from other EVs are the solar panels set into the body of the car on all sides. These will allow the Sion to generate its own electricity, which can add up to roughly 150 miles of range per week to the regular battery and create “full self-sufficiency on short distances,” per the Sono website.
The Sion's solar panels will allow the vehicle to generate its own electricity, adding up to about 150 miles of range per week to the regular battery.Photo: Sono Motors
Over the past five years, Sono developed the technology to do more than just slap some solar panels on the roof of the Sion.
“We had to develop a completely new technology and get experts from the automotive sector and from the solar sector and let them sit together,” Christians said. “Because these were two separate industries, and they did not talk with each other so much. And so we had to have … the experts sit together and bring up solutions that are automotive-grade and made to be really durable and sustainable.”
Sono left behind the fragile and heavy glass encasements that solar panels typically rely on in favor of monocrystalline silicon cells protected by a layer of polymer, integrated into the body of the car itself. The polymer is shatterproof and provides extra protection for the cells in the case of collision.
Sono signed a binding contract with Finnish manufacturer Valmet Automotive in April and already has at least 19,000 pre-order customers, all of whom have already paid a down payment of roughly 2,000 euros (though these payments are refundable once the car is available).
While the Sion is Sono’s flagship, it represents just the first of Sono’s two pillars. The company’s solar bus kit is the tip of the potentially fruitful iceberg of licensing its technology to other, non-Sono vehicle makers. Christians said the company’s focus is divided “fifty-fifty” between these two priorities, as both have huge potential for growth.
Sono co-founder Jona Christians said the company’s focus is divided “fifty-fifty” between its passenger vehicle and a solar bus kit.Photo: Sono Motors
“In Europe alone, there are 80,000 buses driving around, and all of these buses have the potential to integrate solar,” Christians said, pointing out that just a few manufacturers make the vast majority of Europe’s fleet. Sono adapted its bus kit to fit the most common models. While the buses are primarily diesel-powered, the addition of the solar panels can generate enough power to run the buses’ auxiliary systems, such as lights, heating and cooling. Sono estimates that the systems save nearly 400 gallons of diesel per bus per year.
The company is also in talks with other automakers to share its technology. “We don’t want to simply keep it for ourselves,” Christians said. “There is a bigger problem, and that’s climate change.”
For the time being, Sono is focused on the European market, though it has seen interest from other markets. Of its 19 unnamed B2B partners, Sono already has one in the U.S. applying Sono solar technology to its own vehicles.
Sono’s model brings together two emerging trends as the world looks to address climate change: The price of solar technology has fallen even as efficiency has improved, while at the same time, the public is clamoring for EVs.
Of course, Sono is also emerging right as the supply chain of critical minerals needed for both batteries and solar tech is in serious trouble, something Christians acknowledged has had an impact. He expressed optimism at the company’s path ahead, though.
“Because production will start next year, we are still able to adapt and change to make sure we have all materials in place,” he said.
Sono has suffered major production delays in the past — its first round of pre-orders was set for delivery in 2019 — which have cost the company, at the very least reputationally. Sono went public in November 2021, which brought the influx of cash it needed to get to this production design step.
The Sion is set for delivery in early 2023.
How tech is tackling climate change — and reckoning with its own impact on the planet.
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Lisa Martine Jenkins is a senior reporter at Protocol covering climate. Lisa previously wrote for Morning Consult, Chemical Watch and the Associated Press. Lisa is currently based in Brooklyn, and is originally from the Bay Area. Find her on Twitter ( @l_m_j_) or reach out via email (ljenkins@protocol.com).
The Inflation Reduction Act could make it easier for Big Tech to meet its climate goals. But the major players aren’t backing the bill yet.
How serious is Big Tech is about meeting the climate moment?
Lisa Martine Jenkins is a senior reporter at Protocol covering climate. Lisa previously wrote for Morning Consult, Chemical Watch and the Associated Press. Lisa is currently based in Brooklyn, and is originally from the Bay Area. Find her on Twitter ( @l_m_j_) or reach out via email (ljenkins@protocol.com).
Sens. Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer shook the political world when they announced they’d reached agreement this week on $369 billion in climate spending, just two weeks after Manchin seemed to abandon the endeavor. The cash is part of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, and it would be the biggest climate investment in U.S. history.
The bill — if passed, of course — would pour money into clean energy manufacturing and deployment, from wind turbines to heat pumps. That would dovetail well with the tech sector’s decarbonization plans and investments. Yet Big Tech is still largely on the sidelines when it comes to supporting the bill.
Protocol asked major tech companies for their reactions and specifically whether they plan to lobby in favor of the bill. All of those contacted — Amazon and AWS, Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Salesforce — have made net zero commitments, and in some cases are even more ambitious with their decarbonization plans (see: Microsoft’s carbon negativity goal).
Yet only Salesforce responded saying it explicitly supports the legislation.
“We urgently need to move our country forward to a more sustainable future, one that will create jobs, reduce pollution, drive greater economic security and increase equity and access to clean energy for lower-income communities,” the company’s executive vice president of government affairs Eric Loeb told Protocol. “The $369 billion climate and clean energy investments in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 helps to do that and we’re keeping close attention knowing that provisions may still be amended.”
Salesforce was also one of the very few major tech companies to support the climate investments in the Build Back Better Act. (Microsoft eventually offered its support for Build Back Better, though roughly a month after Manchin killed it the first time.) Earlier this month, Chief Impact Officer Suzanne DiBianca publicly called on Congress to act on climate legislation in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision restricting the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
An AWS representative referred Protocol to the trade group the American Council on Renewable Energy rather than comment directly. ACORE, for its part, released an enthusiastic press release on Wednesday about the bill. The group’s president and CEO Gregory Wetstone called the news a “huge relief” and said that its provisions “will spur critical investments in renewable power, energy storage, and advanced grid technologies that will allow us to meet our climate goals.”
Representatives for Google and Microsoft said neither company had a comment at this time. Neither Apple nor Meta responded to Protocol’s questions on the proposed legislation, and Amazon did not send a comment at the time of publication.
The relative silence of leading tech companies raises questions about their commitments to the ambitious decarbonization plans they’ve put forward. Many of those plans include commitments to reduce Scope 3 emissions tied to the use of their products, which are by far the biggest chunk of tech companies’ emissions.
“If a company is sincere about achieving zero emissions, they should be lobbying for climate policy to be in place to help society,” Jamie Beck Alexander, the director of Drawdown Labs, told Protocol a few months ago.
The Inflation Reduction Act could do just that. Independent analysis by research firm Rhodium Group said it would cut U.S. carbon emissions 31% to 44% below 2005 levels in 2030, in part due to how the legislation could help decarbonize the grid.
Some tech companies worked behind the scenes to get Business Roundtable, a trade group for major corporations, to drop its opposition to the Build Back Better Act. Yet the legislation still died. With a razor-thin margin in the Senate, Democrats will need all hands on deck to pass the Inflation Reduction Act. Having the tech industry throw its entire weight behind it could help steer the bill toward passage — and show just how serious Big Tech is about meeting the climate moment.
This piece will be updated with further tech company reactions if and when they are made public.
Lisa Martine Jenkins is a senior reporter at Protocol covering climate. Lisa previously wrote for Morning Consult, Chemical Watch and the Associated Press. Lisa is currently based in Brooklyn, and is originally from the Bay Area. Find her on Twitter ( @l_m_j_) or reach out via email (ljenkins@protocol.com).
Protocol talks to Soul Machines’ CEO about the power of AI in the metaverse
GREG CROSS (CEO, Soul Machines)
GREG CROSS (CEO, Soul Machines) is one of the original tech nomads, spending his career traveling to and living in every major tech market in the world. He now lives in New Zealand but creates businesses that compete on the international stage. Most recently, PowerbyProxi, a wireless charging company he co-founded, was sold to Apple in 2017. In 2016, Greg co-founded Soul Machines to build a Human OS™ for Artificial Intelligence and explore the future of human-machine cooperation.
Soul Machines is at the cutting edge of AGI research with its unique Digital Brain, based on the latest neuroscience and developmental psychology research. Partnering with innovative people and brands like Carmelo Anthony, Procter & Gamble, NESTLÉ® TOLL HOUSE®, Maryville University, and The World Health Organization, Soul Machines is re-imagining what is possible in the delivery and underlying economics of empathetic customer experience. Greg holds multiple chair positions, is the Sir John Logan Campbell Executive in Residence at the University of Auckland Business School, and was inducted into the New Zealand Hi-Tech Hall of Fame in 2019.
Nicklaus meets and chats online with his Digital Twin in May 2022.
Soul Machines co-founder and CEO Greg Cross and his co-founder Mark Sagar, Ph.D., FRSNZ are leading their Auckland and San Francisco-based teams to create AI-enabled Digital People™ to populate the internet, at first, and soon the metaverse. As this field has grown over the past six years, enterprise brands and celebrities have increasingly turned to Soul Machines to digitize their workforces and level up in how they engage with customers and fans.
They humanize AI to create Digital People that take input from the environment — a question, a facial expression like a smile — and respond in real time. Digital People, such as the one used by Nestle to serve as a digital cookie coach on its website, allow brands to offer an empathic and ultra-personalized customer experience.
Using similar autonomous automation technology, Digital Twins take the customer and fan experience to another level. The celebrity-based avatars boast lifelike features because a real person is captured, creating a “Digital Twin” of the star’s likeness. It can answer customers’ questions with responses that are aligned with the celebrity’s expertise, background and legacy.
The entertainment and sports industries could benefit from developing interactive digital avatars, but the cross-pollination of virtual animation and AI must veer far from 2Pac-hologram territory. Soul Machines’ approach is layered with next-gen AI applications, such as its Digital Brain technology, which allows for natural-language processing and empathetic, responsive behavior. In layman’s terms, that means we could talk to these Digital Twins in real time, but in the entertainment world, that relationship could get even more compelling.
Protocol spoke to Cross to learn more about their newest release, a Digital Twin of Jack Nicklaus, the retired golfing champ who’s won a stunning 117 tournaments. Depicting Nicklaus at 38 years old, his Digital Twin represents the potential of this technology, allowing fans to ask questions and hear stories from his 60-plus years on the links.
Digital Twins will soon partner with retail brands (among others) to offer expertise and recommendations on products and services, as well. Cross takes us on a tour into a technology that may be nascent now but could soon become the competitive edge that sets successful brands apart from the rest.
Extensive capture technology maps Nicklaus’ facial expressions.
What motivated you to launch Soul Machines with Mark Sagar, and what makes your Digital People appealing to brands?
I’m a serial tech entrepreneur, and I just came out of a previous business that sold to Apple. I started looking around for my next move and, through a mutual friend, was reintroduced to Mark. I had met him before, and he blew me away with who he is as a person and his commitment to his life’s work. He’s won two Academy Awards for the animation technology he built that was used in films such as “Avatar” and “King Kong.”
We had a beer, and he talked about coming up with a new paradigm for animating digital characters, and Soul Machines began soon after, in July 2016.
As for our Digital People, we see them as the future of customer and fan engagement. We’re living in an increasingly digital world, and the major challenge for brands is creating those personal connections with fans in a more digital world. And that’s where Digital People become important.
We, as humans, are hardwired to emotionally engage face-to-face. Soul Machines technology can autonomously automate back-and-forth conversations that are each unique. We see Digital People being such an incredible way to create scalable customer interactions in digital worlds.
What competitive advantage would these avatars offer to enterprise brands?
If I create a digital workforce, all of a sudden, I’ve created a highly scalable workforce that is always on. Those customer-centric Digital People can have 1,000 or 100,000 conversations, and these are uniquely personal interactions that are hard to achieve and staff in the real world today. Conversational AI becomes that repository for the brand experience.
Also, brands get a smoother consistency of experiences with Digital People who can retain all that data from those interactions. Especially as we move into metaverse worlds of tomorrow, adopting this technology will truly offer competitive advantages to brands.
The Digital Jack Nicklaus avatar is fascinating to us. How did you create it? How did he react to the idea?
We’ve always wanted to be in the digital celebrity experience space. We first worked with rapper will.i.am in 2019 by creating his Digital Twin for an AI documentary series.
We wanted to test this concept further by having amazing CGI lead to hyper-realistic people who are autonomously animated to create the ultimate fan experience.
We are in talks with a range of different celebrities. We enjoyed the enthusiasm Jack Nicklaus and the Nicklaus Companies have for moving the brand into the future.
With Soul Machines, he wanted to extend his brand to the next generation of golfers. He wanted to be 38 again, when he was at the prime of his career, so we scanned him and his son Gary, who looks so much like him. The kind of storytelling engagement that will come from Digital Jack will build off all the tournaments he’s won and the many golf courses he’s designed.
Share your vision for how you think the metaverse will mature in the coming years, and how Soul Machines will play a role in that maturation.
We are only at the beginning of the metaverse. The hardware that brings it to life hasn’t matured yet, and isn’t defined as a tech stack now. The most important thing for us is to encourage brands to think about how investing in something today creates seamless experiences tomorrow.
AI gets stronger and better with each interaction, and that’s why Digital People provide the most personable and scalable customer experiences that will live on the metaverse and elsewhere. We envision a digital workforce that can move seamlessly between 2D and immersive worlds, and that’s really exciting to us.
Don’t know what to do this weekend? We’ve got you covered.
Our favorite picks for your weekend enjoyment.
Janko Roettgers (@jank0) is a senior reporter at Protocol, reporting on the shifting power dynamics between tech, media, and entertainment, including the impact of new technologies. Previously, Janko was Variety's first-ever technology writer in San Francisco, where he covered big tech and emerging technologies. He has reported for Gigaom, Frankfurter Rundschau, Berliner Zeitung, and ORF, among others. He has written three books on consumer cord-cutting and online music and co-edited an anthology on internet subcultures. He lives with his family in Oakland.
This week we’re testing our Netflix knowledge, rewatching “Ex Machina” and hunting for some good grub.
Are you done watching “The Bear” on Hulu? Then this is the perfect follow-up series. Netflix’s “Street Food” documentary series has been shining a light on some of the best food carts and trucks around the world. Now the show is coming to the U.S., and the season is starting off with what some would consider the street food capital of the world: Los Angeles. What makes the show great is that it doesn’t just find vendors that are representative of the incredibly rich and diverse food culture of L.A., but it also shines a light on the people manning the counter, working the grill and putting their life into their dishes. I dare you to watch the first episode and not wonder where the next taco truck is …
The story of human-made creations turning on their masters has been told for centuries, but rarely in such a mind-bending way. “Ex Machina” makes you question the fine line between heroism and villainy, all while exploring the role of AI in our future. The movie was first released in 2014, but now’s a good time to rewatch it, as Plex is streaming it for free through the end of the month as part of a limited showing of A24 movies.
Here’s your chance to prove your couch potato creds: NFLXdle is a minigame that shows the cover art of Netflix originals with varying degrees of pixelation. It’s not a new idea, but the challenging part is that Netflix itself has so many different versions of its cover art. NFLXdle was made by AugX Labs, whose CEO just told us about the role these kinds of minigames play in the company’s product development process.
The story of Axie Infinity is a cautionary tale for anyone interested in the future of gaming and entertainment. The effects of the crypto downturn on average Axie Infinity players has nowhere been more dramatic than in the Philippines, whose players at one point made up 40% of the game’s user base. Time magazine visited some of them to learn how the crypto roller coaster affected their lives.
A version of this story also appeared in today’s Entertainment newsletter; subscribe here.
Janko Roettgers (@jank0) is a senior reporter at Protocol, reporting on the shifting power dynamics between tech, media, and entertainment, including the impact of new technologies. Previously, Janko was Variety's first-ever technology writer in San Francisco, where he covered big tech and emerging technologies. He has reported for Gigaom, Frankfurter Rundschau, Berliner Zeitung, and ORF, among others. He has written three books on consumer cord-cutting and online music and co-edited an anthology on internet subcultures. He lives with his family in Oakland.
Being cash flow-positive means never having to say you’re sorry.
“Every day you’re seeing news about layoffs, and so we want to be compassionate about that happening in the ecosystem, but also be grateful that Notion is a company that continues to do well,” said Notion COO Akshay Kothari.
Biz Carson ( @bizcarson) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol, covering Silicon Valley with a focus on startups and venture capital. Previously, she reported for Forbes and was co-editor of Forbes Next Billion-Dollar Startups list. Before that, she worked for Business Insider, Gigaom, and Wired and started her career as a newspaper designer for Gannett.
Venture capitalists have all been giving the same downturn-survival advice to startups: Cut costs, do layoffs, develop more discipline and get to cash flow-positive.
For collaboration-tool software company Notion, that’s moved the playing field back to familiar turf.
“We find ourselves in an interesting spot because we’ve always been cash flow-positive, and we don’t need to do those things,” said Notion COO Akshay Kothari. “So we’ve been thinking the last six months a lot about ‘Well, if everybody is zigging, how do we zag?’”
Instead of pulling back on investing like many of its peers, the productivity startup has gone on the offense. It acquired calendar app Cron in June and brought on the Flowdash team earlier this month. Notion also leaned into more marketing by launching a global ad campaign — the kind of spending VCs are cautioning against.
The larger macro slowdown hasn’t affected investor interest either, Kothari said. The company had raised $275 million last fall at a $10.3 billion post-money valuation. Instead of raising more cash or an extension round like many startups this summer, Notion recently completed an internal tender in which where Sequoia and Index bought former and current employee shares at the same price as its last funding round. That didn’t mean any more cash for the company, but it was a valuable morale booster at a time when companies like Stripe and Instacart have been slashing the valuation of employee shares.
“That was a great signal for both the employees and our future recruits that our valuation is still very strong, and top-tier investors like Sequoia and Index are interested in buying more,” Kothari said.
Being aggressive in a larger downturn is a position not every startup finds itself in right now. Companies have been instituting hiring freezes and slashing head count, from TikTok to Unity to Substack. Klarna saw its valuation fall from $45.6 billion last June to $6.7 billion this July in its latest funding round.
Notion isn’t immune to the headwinds either. A lot of its customers are startups, so any downturn that causes them to cut costs could mean tools like Notion might be on the chopping block. Kothari says the company is watching its small-business churn closely right now because of it, but it’s also seeing its mid-level enterprise numbers rise. After reading about Marc Benioff’s regrets for not investing more in 2009 when Salesforce found itself performing better than expected during that financial crisis, Kothari said he realized Notion’s move in this environment was to watch its own numbers closely, but to play offense while it can to gain ground.
For Notion, that means launching a global ad campaign at a time when companies are cutting back on marketing spend and targeting a consumer market to get people to use its products not just for work but also to manage their daily lives.
Notion launched a global ad campaign at a time startups are being told to cut marketing spend.Photo: Notion
It’s also become much more active in M&A with its recent acquisition of Cron and the addition of the Flowdash team in the last two months. It’s not the only company finding such opportunities. Companies like cryptocurrency exchange FTX have seen this time as a prime buying moment, and FTX’s founder Sam Bankman-Fried has invested in many companies in the distressed crypto space. (He’s also taken a similar playbook to Notion and covered downtown San Francisco with ads featuring his headshot.)
Notion hasn’t been on the same scale of M&A spree, but Kothari has noted a definite shift in entrepreneurs' attitudes toward deals. As funding has dried up and there are fewer paths to an exit, he’s found more founders are willing to become part of bigger companies — and Notion’s open to more conversations.
“I would say we're very much in the market to continue to talk to companies both on the product side as well as on the acquihire side and see how we can accelerate our road map internally,” Kothari said.
The tender offer is another move, but not one every company can make. Allowing employees to sell shares before an IPO used to be more taboo in the startup world, but attitudes have shifted over time. When sales are executives-only, like in the case of DataRobot, it can be seen as a red flag. Some companies planned to do one, but have also backtracked citing larger market conditions. Ecommerce startup Fabric announced to its employees in May that it was going to do a tender offer, but canceled it 10 days later, Insider reported.
Notion found that its June tender offer, in which current and former employees sold shares to Sequoia and Index, helped employees by showing that the value of their shares wasn’t just on paper.
“It gives employees the ability to not worry about the student debt that they had when they joined the company or maybe the mortgage they have,” Kothari said. “It’s not something that people feel like they can just go retire, but I think it gives them a peace of mind.”
Well, at least for now, Kothari said. He and Notion CEO Ivan Zhao have talked a lot about how they’re grateful to be in a cash flow-positive position to start and not reworking their business to get there like many. Now the challenge is to remain in growth mode and stay there, despite the market. Kothari knows not to take it for granted.
“Every day you’re seeing news about layoffs, and so we want to be compassionate about that happening in the ecosystem, but also be grateful that Notion is a company that continues to do well,” Kothari said. “It may not be forever — it needs us to all be intensely focused on the market and continue to do well, because that's the only way these things can continue to happen in the future.”
Biz Carson ( @bizcarson) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol, covering Silicon Valley with a focus on startups and venture capital. Previously, she reported for Forbes and was co-editor of Forbes Next Billion-Dollar Startups list. Before that, she worked for Business Insider, Gigaom, and Wired and started her career as a newspaper designer for Gannett.
Charging batteries is what keeps most electric vehicles on the road. But swapping out dead batteries for new ones could be a model that takes off in specific corners of the U.S. EV market.
While a handful of startups are trying to get it to take off stateside, the headwinds against battery swapping may keep it relegated to a handful of uses and industries.
Lisa Martine Jenkins is a senior reporter at Protocol covering climate. Lisa previously wrote for Morning Consult, Chemical Watch and the Associated Press. Lisa is currently based in Brooklyn, and is originally from the Bay Area. Find her on Twitter ( @l_m_j_) or reach out via email (ljenkins@protocol.com).
Electric vehicle infrastructure has traditionally focused on plug-in chargers. But swapping out batteries near death for fresh ones is an alternative approach to keeping EVs on the go.
The practice has found a toehold in China, but so far failed to break through in the U.S. While a handful of startups are trying to get it to take off stateside, the headwinds against the technology may keep it relegated to a handful of uses and industries.
Chinese EV company Nio has carved out a battery-swapping niche in the country’s luxury market. That’s in part because, when done right, battery swapping can essentially replicate the gas station experience: a quick stopover before heading back to the road. The practice promises to eliminate the “range anxiety” that surveys show plagues would-be EV owners by softening the transition, especially for drivers for whom time is of the essence. Yet even in China, the technology has yet to be fully embraced for a handful of reasons that have also slowed battery swapping from spreading in the U.S.
“If saving 20 minutes is so important for you that you would be willing to pay hundreds of dollars more — or even thousands of dollars more — then battery swapping will do it for you,” said Gil Tal, a researcher at the University of California, Davis, Institute of Transportation Studies. He added that anyone who claims battery swapping could viably overtake fast charging is “trolling us.”
Battery swapping, while quick, is hardly as seamless as changing the AAA batteries in a television remote. EV batteries are heavy, requiring expensive robotic arms to switch them out. Furthermore, the practice by definition requires more than one battery per vehicle, which adds to a car’s cost. At a time when battery materials come at a premium and the U.S. battery supply chain is still being built, that puts the technology at a distinct disadvantage compared to charging.
However, Tal said that in certain “edge cases,” swapping might make sense.
“In the near-term, I think where these companies could find success is in particular, discreet business models where they make sense,” said Dave Mullaney, a principal on the carbon-free mobility team at the think tank RMI, citing urban micromobility, last-mile urban delivery and certain types of trucking.
Ample, the most prominent battery-swapping startup in the U.S., is taking a slightly different approach, though. The company is prioritizing commercial auto fleets.
Ample has created an adapter plate that slots into the space where an EV battery resides, which is then fitted with multiple battery modules that are smaller and lighter than a full battery. It’s cheaper and easier to change out these modules at a swapping station. These stations are relatively easy to set up because of the modular nature of the batteries they’re swapping out, said Ample CEO and co-founder Khaled Hassounah.
“We need a couple of parking spots and a flat piece of land, and in a couple of weeks, we can get a station up and running that works just like a gas station: five minutes to get a 100% charge,” Hassounah said.
So far, Ample has deployed its technology in roughly 100 vehicles in the Bay Area. Those vehicles are primarily Ubers, which Ample has a partnership with. The startup’s goal is to have at least 1,000 vehicles with its swapping technology onboard by the end of 2022. That’s not exactly a sign battery swapping is ready for prime time, but the company has raised more than $275 million over four funding rounds, indicating plenty of VC interest. Ample also plans to expand to Madrid, Spain, and Kyoto, Japan, and it will eventually cater to individual EV owners.
A recent report from Straits Research paints a fairly optimistic picture of the potential market for battery swapping, led by the edge cases Mullaney mentioned. The researchers found that the U.S. market was valued at $15 million in 2021, but could grow to as much as $138 million by 2030. That’s big growth, but still relatively small compared to the EV charging market; a separate Grand View Research evaluation found that that market had a value of $2.9 billion in the U.S. last year, and it could grow by nearly 37% annually between now and 2030.
Two- and three-wheeler passenger vehicles dominate swapping, accounting for 55% of the market. Micromobility is an appealing market for battery swapping, Tal said, because the batteries are smaller and easier to change without robot assistance. India, for instance, is close to finalizing a nationwide battery-swapping policy for two- and three-wheelers, which make up a huge chunk of the country’s transportation fleet.
“For American cars, it’s a lot tougher,” Tal added.
The report also found that if automakers and battery swapping companies like Ample collaborate on making new EVs swapping-compatible, that could nudge the market to grow further. But Tal is skeptical that there would be much buy-in from these automakers, many of which have already invested heavily in EV charging.
The past of battery-swapping also doesn’t really inspire much confidence in a bright future where it overtakes charging. Israeli startup Better Place emerged in 2007, and coordinated a number of pilot projects with Renault-Nissan in its tenure. Despite wrangling more than $600 million in investments, the company filed for bankruptcy in 2013.
Tesla has also dipped a toe into swapping out batteries in its vehicles, offering the service as part of a pilot project for the Model S in 2013. However, a former Tesla executive told Reuters that the swapping process was “a pain in the ass,” and the project sunsetted after two years. Tesla instead threw its weight behind building out its Supercharger network, which has become a major selling point.
The company found that charging is simply what most drivers prefer: “People don’t care about pack swap,” Tesla founder Elon Musk told the company’s shareholders in 2015.
“If I was a swapping company in the U.S., I would be forgetting about passenger cars right now,” said Mullaney. “I’d be looking at specific, micromarket segments that would allow me to get my foothold.”
Lisa Martine Jenkins is a senior reporter at Protocol covering climate. Lisa previously wrote for Morning Consult, Chemical Watch and the Associated Press. Lisa is currently based in Brooklyn, and is originally from the Bay Area. Find her on Twitter ( @l_m_j_) or reach out via email (ljenkins@protocol.com).
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