I’m Sorry, I Don’t Have Any Balance
Yesterday I sat in a room with the earliest and most active (forum wise) private customers of Better Place. People who received the first cars and who voluntarily participate in what Better Place calls it’s “Champions Forum”. I follow this as best I can and it’s leading to me improving my Hebrew reading.
The meeting was in Hebrew so I was concentrating very hard to keep up (and missing a lot). Shai Agassi spoke to answer questions and lead the meeting.
These customers could be the most critical, and they have lots of suggestions, but every single one was positive. There was not one negative story anyone could come up with about Better Place or it’s service so far. And these were Israelis. These customers started driving before there were switch stations: they’ve experienced glitches and beta issues. No complaints, only positive suggestions.
There are no shy Israelis: if anyone had wanted to whine they would have. The praise was heartfelt and meant. Thank you to everyone at Better Place.
Oh and my iPhone’s battery went dead: I wish I could have switched it out for a new one. I wonder why I couldn’t?
About the Author
Brian of London is not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy. Since making aliyah in 2009, Brian has blogged at Israellycool. Brian's interests include world peace and an end to world hunger. Besides blogging here, Brian of London now writes for PJ Media. Brian of London also hosted Shire Network NewsFiled Under: Brian of London • General
Last Night I started reading “Start up Nation” which looks at the reason why Israel is so good at creating start ups.
The introduction was all about Shai Agassi and Better Place.
Hi,
this question is not exactly related to this article, but it’s about Better Place, and it’s something I’ve been wondering about for some time. Maybe you’ll know the answer, or you can pass the question along to someone who does:
Better Place claims that their model can accommodate multiple types of batteries, and therefore multiple types of cars. This is perfectly doable, as long as the battery comes out at the bottom of the car.
However, judging from all the videos of battery swaps I’ve seen so far (and I try my best to see all that are available) the floor of the swap stations (the part that opens) seems to fit the Fluence’s wheelbase perfectly, i.e. the opening spans from just behind the front wheels to just in front the rear wheels. So the stations can easily accommodate Fluence-sized cars, or possibly longer ones, but it seems to me that if a smaller car with a shorter wheelbase tried to go through the battery swap, either the front wheels or the rear wheels would have the floor pulled from under them, and the car would fall through the floor onto the battery switching mechanism, which would be rather embarrassing.
Now as far as I know, the next car designed for the network is the Renault Zoe – obviously a much shorter car than the Fluence. [there seems to be a consensus among everyone, up to and including Renault, never to mention Better Place unless absolutely necessary, so Renault won't say that the car has a swappable battery, neither on their website nor in their presentation materials. But if you ask them directly, they'll confirm that yes, the Zoe will indeed support the Better Place swap station model. Considering how they go on about trivial details like ultra-aerodynamic door handles and super-stylish design elements, not mentioning the swappable battery is all the more absurd, but there you go.]
So are my (limited) observations correct? Are the current stations really incompatible with the upcoming Zoe? If so, what does Better Place plan to do about it, and in what time frame?
Thank you.