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The mysterious story of the battery startup that promised GM a 200-mile electric car

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#1 ·
The mysterious story of the battery startup that promised GM a 200-mile electric car
Quartz
December 19, 2013
by Steve LeVine

At the end of November 2012, Atul Kapadia and Sujeet Kumar hosted the staff of their startup company for a holiday lunch of Mexican food at a Palo Alto, California restaurant. For days, the pair—the CEO and CTO, respectively, of a lithium-ion battery company called Envia Systems—had awaited an email from General Motors.

It was to contain a deal rare to an industry newcomer—a contract worth tens and possibly hundreds of millions of dollars to provide the electric central nervous system for two showcase GM models including the next-generation Chevy Volt. Untested small suppliers almost never get in the door of the world’s major automakers, which regard them as too risky to rely on. But GM was won over by what seemed to be the world’s best lithium-ion battery—a cell that, if all went well, would catapult the company to a commanding position in the industry with a middle-class electric car that traveled 200 miles on a single charge and rid motorists of the “range anxiety” that disquieted them about such vehicles.

A year later, the deal is in tatters, GM has accused Envia of misrepresenting its technology, and a document suggests why the carmaker may be right. The startup’s unraveling is a blow for GM as it transitions to a new regime next month under CEO-designate Mary Barra, setting back its ambitions in the potentially gigantic future electric-car industry. It also risks making Envia, the recipient of several small federal grants, another punching bag for critics of US government funding of advanced battery companies.

Full article at link.
 
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#19 · (Edited)
This is obviously not good. Hopefully GM has a plan B.
LOT's of AA-cells in series-parallel combination! Replacements available at any Wally-World!

ALWAYS listen to the engineers. There's a reason they're engineers and you hired them. Management and bean counters may be a necessary evil but in the end, they should be smart enough to listen to what their engineering guys have to say about something so serious.
Manglements two-tier "listening" mantra: "...we LISTEN; we IGNORE..."
 
#4 ·
#5 ·
One would not be surprised to see the new Volt perhaps in 2016, but with less of a price difference than Envia promised. The pure 200-mile electric could launch in 2018 or later...

GM was perhaps not snookered, but it was credulous when it should have understood the chart in the Crane appraisal, which one must presume it demanded and was provided.
And yet Akerson has maintained the 200 mile claim as recently as a month ago.
 
#11 ·
GM currently uses Lithium based chemistry cells from LG Chem (Volt, ELR), Hitachi (eAssist) and A123 (Spark EV) systems in it's current cars. GM is likely working with a number of other companies as well testing various chemistries in their huge battery testing laboratory as we speak.

As far as batteries go I would bet GM has a plan B, C, D and F in front of them by now.
 
#7 ·
I find it interesting the the Engineers recommended against Envia, but management decided to go with it anyway.

Reading through the article and the science I can find about this, anything that claims a 300% improvement would raise huge red flags in the engineering world. Seems they were right to recommend against it, too bad the management groups didn't listen.
 
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#10 ·
That's why they're in management. F I mean screw up and move up. :fall:
 
#14 ·
I find it interesting the the Engineers recommended against Envia, but management decided to go with it anyway.
ALWAYS listen to the engineers. There's a reason they're engineers and you hired them. Management and bean counters may be a necessary evil but in the end, they should be smart enough to listen to what their engineering guys have to say about something so serious.


As far as batteries go I would bet GM has a plan B, C, D and F in front of them by now.
Let's hope! I'm still not on the battery bandwagon though. Not yet anyway.
 
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#15 ·
ALWAYS listen to the engineers. There's a reason they're engineers and you hired them. Management and bean counters may be a necessary evil but in the end, they should be smart enough to listen to what their engineering guys have to say about something so serious.
You got it, too many times it is overlooked that engineers are hired for their knowledge and expertise. Listen to what they say, their technical knowledge can prevent a bad mistake. The business side is important if done right, they keep the engineers in check so that the product is actually commercially viable (IE people can afford it, it can be completed in a reasonable time, etc...) The problem arises when the business side knows a few technical terms and believes they know what they mean, and what it takes to make it reality.

Reading about what Envia has, I believe that they have a technology that will provide improvements, just not to the scale they claim or in the time they claim. claiming 300% performance improvement for 50% the cost is an obvious red flag to engineers, that is a vary rare accomplishment and usually comes with several caveats (in this case it would only maintain the power density for the first 3 cycles). To the business side it sounds like a great idea that they can profit from.
 
#17 ·
I'm sure there's a backup plan, as the article also suggests. It just might not be quite so cheap, nor have quite that much range.

The same technological hurdles would seem to stand between Elon Musk and his $35K, 200 mile Tesla. Unless the big battery companies are already demonstrating the required technology and have it poised for commercial use, which would make that same tech available to GM and everyone else.

Besides, I think there's too much being made of 200 mile EV range. With Voltec, you really don't need to go much past 50 electric miles, which hovers in the sweet spot for average usage no matter how good the battery technology gets. Beyond that you're carrying around a lot of very-rarely-used capacity (and its weight) most of the time. Voltec is clearly the most sensible "solution" on the planet right now, and should be reasonably scalable, while over the years absorbing advances in both batteries and internal combustion pretty effortlessly. In the meantime, other than up front vehicle cost (which is largely recoverable) there's not a whole lot of downside, including the fact that no real infrastructure change is required. And it works NOW, in fact beautifully!
 
#18 ·
There is a plan B, I assure you. Second I'm with Yamahar1 on this one. You could put an equal price 200 mile GM EV next to a Voltec and I'd choose the Voltec choice every time and twice on Friday. On Friday TWICE because on the weekends I like to get on the road and drive 300 miles to Richmond sometimes and don't wanna have the down time of waiting for my charge to complete.

My thought would be for GM to increase EV time to 150 miles and still have the Voltec solution riding shotgun. Essentially increasing the capacity of the Spark EV by 85% and then putting in a Voltec config. with the 9 gallon tank and all. Drive time is now almost 400 miles. Put that in a Cadillac and you shut idiots up by the dozens
 
#25 ·
There is a plan B, I assure you. Second I'm with Yamahar1 on this one. You could put an equal price 200 mile GM EV next to a Voltec and I'd choose the Voltec choice every time and twice on Friday. On Friday TWICE because on the weekends I like to get on the road and drive 300 miles to Richmond sometimes and don't wanna have the down time of waiting for my charge to complete.

My thought would be for GM to increase EV time to 150 miles and still have the Voltec solution riding shotgun. Essentially increasing the capacity of the Spark EV by 85% and then putting in a Voltec config. with the 9 gallon tank and all. Drive time is now almost 400 miles. Put that in a Cadillac and you shut idiots up by the dozens
Brilliant idea.
The one big fear with single mode EV is running out of power, something that can never happen with Voltec or PHEVs.
Heck, GM could simply increase battery range to say 60 to 80 miles and take a lot of market away from BEVs.

Dedicated platform for Voltec with magnesium and aluminum, purpose designed platform the layout maximized
for lighter weight, better compartment space and better provision of battery storage areas.
 
#20 ·
I still don't get why Federal dollars go to batteries and solar now. It would have been much better to continue hydrogen R&D. My uncle is an engineer that deals with power and runs all the energy facilities at UNC in Chapel Hill - and he's also a progressive, but a guy who says that batteries are dead ends (says the same thing about solar). The pollution from battery manufacture and disposal is far worse than what a combustion engine does. He has thought for awhile that hydrogen, whether in fuel cell or combustion, was the technology to pursue.

The battery and solar stuff is politics at its worth. Both groups were huge donors to President Obama and Democrats, so they get the Federal money and the government encourages chasing battery tech. Under the Bush Administration is was more about hydrogen, but the Republicans are just as bad at throwing money and regulations after what benefits them too.

GM pursues this stuff because they get a lot of benefit from them on the credits for the fuel standards. The problem is that the next administration could have different priorities and force a complete change. So GM gets stuck one way or another - and this time gets stuck because someone made pie in the sky promises and they believed them. I have no doubt the engineers knew better, but the suits LOVE pie in the sky stuff.
 
#29 ·
The problem here, as I see it, is not that the government attempts to invest in advances in technology, but that they play politics with it. Both paths should be pursued. If we can ride like the wind and not pollute any more than necessary (or not at all), why shouldn't we do it?

If that was the realist solution, I wonder what someone else promised GM. It may be that someone thought they'd provide GM with a set of batteries that either tripled the range, cost only a quarter of the current price, or both.
 
#22 ·
John Voelcker, editor of Green Car Reports, said it is “naïve” to conclude that GM lacks alternatives to Envia’s technology. One reason for the push behind the 200-mile car had been to blunt Tesla Motors (paywall), whose CEO, Elon Musk, has boasted of plans for a $35,000, 200-mile pure electric vehicle. About a month after the divorce with Envia, a GM executive told reporters that the carmaker has a battery to produce a 200-mile car but that it still costs too much for commercial use. “GM is a competitive company. They have no intention to let Tesla own the market for $35,000, 200-mile cars,” Voelcker said.

That, to me, is the most interesting quote from this very interesting article. Will GM "bite the bullet" and produce electric vehicles at a substantial loss to prevent Tesla from getting a foot-hold in and dominating a mainstream price segment with a vehicle that is cutting edge? Old GM was willing to do this (Well, kind of with the Solstice, Sky); Will the relatively successful/profitable new GM be willing to do the same?

Yup.:yup:
 
#23 · (Edited)
That, to me, is the most interesting quote from this very interesting article. Will GM "bite the bullet" and produce electric vehicles at a substantial loss to prevent Tesla from getting a foot-hold in and dominating a mainstream price segment with a vehicle that is cutting edge? Old GM was willing to do this (Well, kind of with the Solstice, Sky); Will the relatively successful/profitable new GM be willing to do the same?

Yup.:yup:
Take a look at the table on page 8 of this older (June 2006) statistical analyses of corporate risk takers: http://www.amstat.org/publications/jse/v18n1/kachapova.pdf

...wonder where GM and Ford rank (Beta coefficients) on that list today?
 
#28 ·
I suspect that GM and Ford's engineering are both far more advanced with a lot of concept technology than their so called JV partners, these JVs are a great way to have a look see at what partners are proposing without getting deeply committed.

You saw that recently with Ford pulling out of the Toyota JV to develop a hybrid Truck, I suspect that Ford knew
it was a long way ahead of Toyota and that a lot of the development work flow would have been from Ford to Toyota...
 
#31 ·
Three word answer: WEATHER, CLOUDS and DIURNAL-cycle.
 
#37 ·
Actually: As Historian Jeffrey Burton Russell points out (and is referenced in commonly available sources such as Wikipedia): "...the flat-earth error flourished most between 1870 and 1920, and had to do with the ideological setting created by struggles over evolution.[6] Russell claims "with extraordinary [sic] few exceptions no educated person in the history of Western Civilization from the third century B.C. onward believed that the earth was flat", and credits histories by John William Draper, Andrew ****son White, and Washington Irving for popularizing the flat-earth myth.[7]" end quote.

In approx. 240 BC Scientist and Greek Astronomer Eratosthenes of Cyrene was able to apply critical thinking skills to observations of the sun and the moon and not only realize that the Earth was round, but to calculate its' circumference to within about 2% of todays accepted value.

So - No, 97% of scientist did not believe in the 16th century that the Earth was flat. Nor did Christopher Columbus in the later part of the 15th century. However, lets suspend all logic and "pretend" that your statement was correct. Would that then discount everything that scientist concluded for the rest of time? Or might we want to consider how often such a thing actually happened (if it ever really did) and take that into account?

What ever happened to critical thinking skills?
 
#40 · (Edited)
P-s-s-s-s-t!

BIG brother (NSA) is listening and, like Santa Claus, he's "...making a list..." but he's NOT making COAL deliveries (wink,wink)!

NSA -- using PC's(*) to enforce PC since 911.





(*) and iPhones and cell phones and iPads...
 
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