Better Place Australia Finance Round Raises $25 Million for EV Infrastructure Project
By John O'Dell November 30, 2009
Electric vehicle battery services provider Better Place said its Australian unit has secured an AUD$25 million ($22.9 million U.S.) initial financing round from a group of investors that includes the Canberra electric utility and was led by Lend Lease Ventures, a global investment firm.
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Proposed battery exchange station where drivers of cars with swappable batteries could replace depleted packs.
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Better Place Australia has announced a five-year plan to raise AUD$1 billion ($915.7 million U.S.) to fund deployment of an EV battery charging and battery exchange network.
The initial funding will finance engineering, planning and project demonstrations.The initial commercial charging system is slated to be deployed in the Canberra area, south of Syndey, begining in 2011.
Better Place, a Northern California-based company, has set up operating subsidiaries in Denmark, Israel and Australia and has agreements with government and utility agencies in those and several other countries to facilitate development of infrastructure networks for electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles.
The company is working with the Renault-Nissan Alliance to provide a coordinated launch of electeric vehicles and public charging and battery exchange networks in Israel and Denmark.
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Very intersting development. Is there a vehicle developer missing in the consortium, willing to develop modular vehicle concepts? Different vehicles able to work with the same battery packs.
Or is BP more and more focusing on fast charging?
GM has the second iteration after the EV1 desaster working with range extenders, will be intersting seeing better place 2.0!
But over all don't forget ecodriving see http://www.recodrive.eu
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