Project Better Place plans to launch the test phase of its subscription-based system in early 2008.
Shai Agassi has gone from SAP to EV.
The former president of products and technology at German software maker SAP announced a long awaited cleantech project today, aimed at building a network of charging stations for electric vehicles around the world.
Investors have put up $200 million for the subscription-based electric charging system, called Project Better Place, with half of that cash coming from Tel Aviv chemical, shipping and technology company Israel Corp.
Agassi, who left SAP in March, said he expects to start the test phase of the project in early 2008, moving up to a few thousand cars signed up by 2009.
He hopes to add 10,000 cars to the system per month in 2010, with a total of 100,000 cars on the system in each pilot site by the end of that year.
"We're the first electric recharge grid. We believe that there will be others. We believe this is a compelling idea that will not stay just with us," Agassi, CEO of Project Better Place, said in a news conference.
"If a lot of other players come into this field and we can find ways to work well together, it will only accelerate this transition."
Agassi's plan is to set up a system similar to the cell phone network, so wherever you roam, your electricity subscription will allow you to charge up at a plug in station no matter which system you're on.
"We're looking for partners, obviously at a regional level, but also on a global level who want to work with us both in the car industry as well as the energy business," he said.
While Project Better Place may be the first third-party charging system, some car companies have proposed systems of their own.
San Carlos, Calif.-based Tesla Motors is working with Foster City, Calif.'s SolarCity on a solar carport for your driveway to power up the high-priced electric Tesla roadster (see Everyone's rolling out products at the solar show).
Electric vehicle maker ZAP (OTC: ZAAP), headquartered in Santa Rosa, Calif., plans to build curbside solar powered charging stations with Chinese partner Youngman Automotive Group (see ZAP going big with China venture).
Check out a ZAP car here >>
Israel Corp. announced its investment in August, but details of the venture were not disclosed at the time. Israel Corp. has a 33 percent stake in Project Better Place, and Israel Corp. chairman Idan Ofer was named chairman of the startup.
The latest backers are Morgan Stanley, VantagePoint Venture Partners, and a group of individual investors including James Wolfensohn, former head of the World Bank, and Edgar Bronfman Sr., former head of Seagram's.
Agassi would not disclose the details of which car or energy companies he's talking to, but said Project Better Place would deploy its network on a country by country basis.
Again using the cell phone model, Agassi said people who sign up for the electricity subscriptions would have a choice of cars they could buy or lease under the program.
"These cars, based on the subscription contract, will also be subsidized, so that the consumers actually will be able to buy an electric car for a cheaper price than they would be able to buy an internal combustion engine based car," he said.
Using their subscriptions, drivers would be able to plug into electric chargers as well as use battery exchange stations that would be set up at parking lots around the world.
The chargers will also be set up as a smart grid, feeding more power to to a car that's only going to be in a parking spot for a short time, and giving a slower charge to a car that will be parked there all day.
While Israel would be a fair bet as an initial location for the project, Israeli-born Agassi would only say that the company would start out in areas that make sense.
"We're looking at places where it's easier to set such networks," he said. "The easier places, obviously, are what we call Transportation Islands."
"Some of these are physical islands, some of them are more concentrated urban centers that have a lot of commuters in a small area that usually do not leave the area, either because of geographic or other limitations that bind them into the area."
The company expects to have a booming business in those early markets within 10 years of rollout.
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Lousy Idea for a business
This scheme has so many obstacles, I'm amazed that
someone was able to get investors to cough up $200 million. The only obstacle to all-electric cars is not, as this startup thinks, the limitations of driving range.
Its also the cost of batteries, which this scheme actually makes worse, by throwing in the massive overhead costs here of maintaining all these stations and battery packs. This is not reducing the costs of ownership of EVs, but increasing them. At best it simply
removes the cost of the batteries from the EV's purchase price, and makes the user pay as they go (whether they go anywhere or not). GM has already floated this idea for their range extended EV, but it's really not necessary, except possibly for the lowest economic groups. The other bad assumption here is that unless the fleet's power is all-electric (from the grid), there is a great loss by driving plug-ins (with 40 mile electric ranges instead). That's totally false - plug-ins with ranges of at least 40 miles can accomplish over 90% of the goals of an all-electric fleet, in terms of both emission and crude oil reduction. Most of the liquid fuel required can be supplied by biofuels at their current levels of production, making arguments in favor of all-electrics even less convincing.
Good Idea for Busines
In contrast to the above comment, I believe that charge up systems for electric vehicles will not only be a good business venture but one which will prove essential as the years go by.
Oil is nearing the $100/barrel and is expected to reach $200/barrel by about 2010. Bio fuels are presently competing with food production and a UN leader has called a temporary halt in this direction. Batteries and ultracapacitors are improving in leaps and bounds. There is even a tram in Japan which can be charged in 60 seconds. I am attempting to gain more information about it.
To say that a charging system would be a poor investment is not good common sense. In a few years, the EV's will be on the roads with a vengence. The development of charging systems will become an essencial part of our transport system.
adrianakau@aol.com
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