Future of Mobility

Today

As a global driver of green initiatives, many EU states have set ambitious 10-year carbon neutrality targets. The EU has invested heavily in the electrification of mobility by providing extensive support for electric vehicle research and ecosystem operators. It will also impose heavy fines on automotive manufacturers that fail to meet sustainability goals. Everything is in place for a rapid transition.

What will change

As EV roll-out accelerates, a new kind of support infrastructure will be needed. The race will be on for multiple players - including manufacturers, electric companies and digital service providers - to work together to form ecosystems that help establish dominance on this new market.

Emerging technologies to watch

Global energy demand is expected to grow from 18bn kWh to 270bn kWh by 2030, with the growth of electric vehicles a major contributor. Technologies for everything from improved battery life, charging station and home charging, smart grid connection, vehicle design and human-car interaction will continue to evolve.

Opportunities worth taking

Gas stations may decrease in numbers when consumers are be able to charge their vehicles at home, at restaurants, in malls - anywhere connection to the grid is possible. New digital services will connect consumers with charging providers, instantly billing customers wherever charging takes place. Inside vehicles, the new real estate offered by giant entertainment screens could encourage a whole new ecosystem of in-vehicle products and services.

Opportunities

Logistics

Governments are incentivizing delivery companies to update their fleets to electric trucks. In cities with Low Emission zones the last-mile delivery can happen tension-free and the maintenance costs and fuel expenses can be kept low compared to current costs.

Mining

Underground mining loaders and trucks use battery packs and electric motors.

Ports

Kalmar (part of Cargotec) aims to offer a fully electric EV equipment portfolio by 2021.

Energy supply

Grid level energy storing gives consumers that chance to become suppliers by compensating demand spikes through connected EV batteries.

Connected vehicles and AI

Wider ranges and improved charging times will create opportunities for charging infrastructure and services.

Circular economy

Collection and recycling of EV batteries can mitigate the need to import key materials (cobalt, nickel, aluminium and lithium) while creating new jobs and mitigating CO2 emissions.

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Market outlook

Total market

Total energy demand for EVs from 18 bn kwh to 92 bn kwh 2020-2025 (McKinsey), EV market size $667 bn, CAGR 19% while EV units CAGR 28%.

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Look at these 2024

Automotive software market $ 50 bn, whatever Tesla is doing as other vehicle manufacturers follow them tightly, ecosystem collaboration & new opportunities from charging to finding and buying local services. Perhaps even sharing your car keys to a friend can go over mobile like a peer-to-peer payment.

Methodology: A high-level view gathered from various openly available data sources on market size & compound annual growth rates. To simplify comparison between analysts sources, we’ve removed differences in market details by calculating an estimated average for total market size 2024 and average CAGR for selected time period. This allows us to gain “correct enough estimates”. Unless linked directly to one source, each of our market estimate has included 2-8 sources e.g. WEF, CB Insights, Mordor Intelligence, Markets & Markets, Research & Markets, Grand View Research, PWC, Allied Market Research, McKinsey, Market Watch

Top 18 unicorn sniffing smart money VCs, 1376 investments 2018-2020

EV, electric vehicle 1%, battery 2%, energy 2%

Source: Crunchbase Pro, accessed: 03/20, research of company description terms between 01/2018-02/2020, investment types: early stage investments by top 18 unicorn sniffing smart money VCs, n=1376 investments

Special focus

Collaboration between manufacturers will shape the ecosystem and value chains. New digital service opportunities are possible when building on EV & infrastructure data & analytics. Designing for the behavioural and paradigm shift is an opportunity where new service, business and revenue models will already emerge within the near future.

Things to consider

Rare minerals

Lithium and cobalt are currently needed to produce batteries. Battery recycling, alternative battery technologies (such as sodium and nickel) and energy efficient, sustainable battery production are some of the major challenges to overcome.

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Data and analytics

Data-driven services for things like battery life optimisation, charging and payment creating potential new markets.

Automated charging

This will create new free time for users.

Expense

EVs are more costly to manufacture and purchase, which is a challenge when creating a market.

Start-ups to watch

G Batteries

Fast charging.

Virta

New charging infrastructure platform.

Ionity

International charging service provider network.

BroadBit

Revolutionary new batteries using novel sodium-based chemistries to power the future green economy.

BrightDrop

Electric delivery infra as a service by GM.

Tech enabling the shift

New nanomaterials in electronics

Energy harvesting and storing with efficient electronic materials.

Electric charging

The charging time depends on the battery capacity and the charging power and are connected to different plug types, use cases and thus infrastructure. The current charge types vary from speed of ~3,5 km/hour to ~128 km/hour.

AI/ML Artificial intelligence (AI)

Computer systems able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence by using a combination of Machine Learning (ML) toolbox of algorithms and learning rules from data.

Battery technology

Lithium-based batteries are largely used in phones & EVs, but alternatives such as sodium or flow & thermal based solutions are likely to compete with environmentally damaging battery materials.