Two years ago I made a hopeful off-topic post here upon sighting a parking lot with charging posts for Better Place’s novel electric vehicle system. I titled in “The future is here!”.
Today I made another sighting – I went into a gas station I haven’t been to before, and there was the wondrous structure you see in the photo – a robotic battery swap station for Better Place’s cars. A few dozen of these stations are said to exist around Israel, but this was the first time I saw one.
Alas, I was a day too late to rejoice. Yesterday Better Place filed for bankruptcy, having failed to grow the business to the extent necessary for solvency. If the future has swappable-battery electric cars in it, that future is no longer here; and when it comes again, Better Place will be remembered as an early pioneer who failed to make the grade.
Shai Agassi’s visionary company was relentlessly pushing to realize its dream of pollution-free, user friendly electric cars. It was innovative and courageous. It was a good company in our midst.
It will be missed.
The vision of an electric car was right, and still is right. But the implementation of that vision was wrong.
Better Place’s business model as a closed-garden electricity provider, and their pricing of the car/electricity package, were criticized from the get-go by many industry experts. Agassi and his peers wouldn’t listen, and when they realized their mistake and tried to change model, it was too late.
Clearly the implementation was wrong… the facts speak for themselves. Nevertheless I lament the dream, and the positive mindset behind it …