Honda Motor, KTM, Piaggio Group and Yamaha Motor join forces to promote replaceable batteries for electric vehicles.
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Piaggio Group (PIA.MI), Honda Motor Co., Ltd, KTM F&E GmbH and Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd have officially signed the agreement to form the Swappable Batteries Motorcycle Consortium (SBMC). This will take place after the letter of intent has been signed on March 1st.
As big names in the motorcycle industry, the Top 4 have expressed their commitment to promoting the widespread use of light electric vehicles in the transportation sector. These include mopeds, scooters, motorcycles, tricycles, and four-wheelers. This is on the way to a more sustainable life cycle management of batteries in the context of international climate policy. The founding members of the consortium believe that the availability of a jointly developed replaceable battery system is the key to the development of low-voltage electric mobility.
“Urban mobility is in a delicate phase of transition to electrification. Thanks to our consortium, which represents four major global players, motorcycles will continue to play a key role in the urban context. Replaceable batteries give the right answer to reduce vehicle charging time and provide users with an additional valuable choice. Urban mobility is part of Piaggio’s DNA and history: our aim is to bring all of our technological know-how and our approach to innovation to the consortium. ”- Michele Colaninno, Head of Strategy and Product, Piaggio Group
Piaggio Vespa Elettrica
The main goal of the consortium is to find solutions to customers’ concerns about the future of electric mobility. This includes the range, the charging time and infrastructure as well as the costs. The consortium sets four main objectives to support the process to achieve this:
- Development of common technical specifications of the exchangeable battery systems
- Confirm the general use of the battery systems
- Make and promote the common specifications of the consortium as a standard in European and international standardization bodies
- Extend the use of the consortium’s common specification to a global level
The members of the consortium will work closely with interested actors and national, European and international standardization bodies in the creation of international technical standards. The availability of charging stations varies from country to country and there is limited information available to end users. Therefore, PIAGGIO, HONDA, KTM and YAMAHA aim with this consortium to involve the decision-makers for the development and use of charging infrastructures in order to promote the increase in light electric vehicles.
“Honda believes the widespread adoption of electric motorcycles can play an important role in creating a more sustainable society. To do this, we have to solve several challenges such as extending the range, shortening the charging time and reducing vehicle and infrastructure costs in order to increase the convenience for customers. In the consortium we have created, founding members from the motorcycle industry and other stakeholders will work together to standardize replaceable batteries, their charging systems, and the surrounding infrastructure to create the environment for their use. Our ultimate goal is to ensure that motorcycles continue to be chosen as a useful means of getting around in the mobility of the future. ”- Yoshishige Nomura, Chief Officer, Motorcycle Operations, Honda Motor Co., Ltd.
The four founding members encourage all interested stakeholders to join the cooperation in order to enrich the expertise of the consortium in order to ensure a wide spread of replaceable standard batteries in the future.
Those interested in joining the SBMC can contact one of the founding members for more information.
“The signing of this consortium agreement is an important step to ensure that PIERER Mobility AG can make further progress, deliver innovations quickly and advance its clear strategic vision for electrically powered two-wheelers. Together with our partners, we will work on the delivery of an interchangeable battery system for low-voltage vehicles (48V) with an output of up to 11kW based on international technical standards. We are very much looking forward to the fact that motorized two-wheelers will continue to play their role in the future of urban and extra-urban mobility. ”- Stefan Pierer, CEO PIERER Mobility AG
There is no doubt that this will be a game changer in the electric motorcycle industry.
“The Swapable Batteries Motorcycle Consortium in Europe is finally ready to start work. I hope that this first step forward will be a beacon that will attract like-minded parties to our mission and lead to transformative change for the future. At Yamaha Motor, we are confident that, through this initiative, we can help harmonize the various technical specifications and standards and help maximize the benefits of electric power for customers around the world. ”- Takuya Kinoshita, Senior Executive Officer, Chief General Manager of Land Mobility Business Operations, Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd.
Also read: Check out the latest BMW electric two-wheelers