Better Place unveiled its electric car software (AutOS) at the Frankfurt Motor Show today and it adds a whole new dimension to what we might expect to see in a typical electric car of the near future.
Better Place is in the process of building a network of battery swapping stations for electric cars. The AutOS software that they are working on is designed to tell drivers where and when to charge their EVs, while tracking data for their billing purposes.
The Better Place business model will see Better Place maintain ownership of the electric car batteries being swapped while drivers will purchase subscription plans similar to cell phones that use “miles” instead of “minutes.” In order to pull this off Better Place will require software capable of tracking the location and charge level of thousands of batteries at a time.
Better Place already has deals set to open battery swapping and charging stations for electric vehicles in Australia, Denmark, Canada, Israel and California and Hawaii in the US.
Swapping stations will use robots to switch out batteries in electric vehicles starting with the first all-electric Renault.
In a quote for the NY Times, Renault spokesperson, Julie Mullins said that, “Renault will be unveiling their first electric-car model that will run on our network and for the first time the whole solution comes together.”
Renault has committed to putting 100,000 of their upcoming new electric vehicle on roads in Denmark and Israel by 2016 which will make for a potent test of the Better Place swapping stations and electric car software.
