[therealarmen]

Better Place failed because swappable batteries don't make sense. The technology is too complex and it would have required a massive leap of faith amongst automakers to adopt the standard from an startup, even one as well-funded as Better Place.

I worked in the electric vehicle industry for 4 years, and it was clear early on that the market was moving towards permanent battery storage (not unlike smartphones) with intermittent charging taking place at public locations. Today, the vast majority of EV charging takes place at home.

Better Place management did not to listen to the market and the company suffered greatly as a result. If they would have pivoted to building recharge stations or charging networks they just may have had a chance to succeed.

[tdicola]

"Better Place failed because swappable batteries don't make sense." Did we read the same article? It seemed pretty clear there were incredible management missteps like burning $500k/day with only a few hundred cars being sold or the CEO going excommunicado for months that destroyed the company. Even with the right tech it sounds like they were setup for failure.

[thebokehwokeh2]

This is a product flaw. It's one amongst the comedy of errors that Better Place did when it came to running a business. Product flaws can be remedied through good leadership. Bad leadership is not something that can be remedied as easily.

[guimarin]

this is just not true. I built a battery exchange vehicle in what amounted to my backyard. range was 180mi. It's not that hard. BP was never a competent tech company but a business guy who latched on to an already existent tech idea.