Ep. 23: Michael Clarke eTrucker app founder on Driver‑Built Tools, Truck‑Ready Charging and Scaling e‑Trucker
文字记录
由机器转录整理而成。译文为机器翻译,可能存在错误。
欢迎来到Smart Charge by RiDERgy播客。我是Claudio Geyken,RiDERgy的创始人兼首席执行官。这是你的节目,可以学习关于能源管理和电动汽车及车队智能充电创新的所有内容。
欢迎回到Smart Charge。今天我们将深入探讨重型电气化的实际应用,嘉宾是Michael Clarke,他是Electro Trucker公司的eTrucker应用的共同创造者。这是一款由驾驶员开发的应用程序,帮助电动卡车驾驶员在欧洲找到适合卡车的充电站,具有卡车基地、夜间停靠点和真实的卡车特定路线规划的筛选功能。在此之前,他曾在一些非常有趣的公司工作,比如Tesla、Porsche和NIO,我们也将深入探讨并了解这些公司的差异以及他参与的有趣项目,例如NIO的智能充电应用程序。
eTrucker团队不是在办公桌前创建这个应用的。共同创始人Tobias Wagner在一年内行驶了100,000公里的电动卡车,以塑造这个工具。在推出时,数据库涵盖了575个卡车充电园区,社区贡献很快又增加了100个,这是驾驶员验证的数据集,团队称其为欧洲最大的卡车充电站数据库。eTrucker在2024年上线,只有三人团队,该应用现已在Android上提供,拥有数千次安装。今天也在iOS上推出了。Michael和我深入探讨了驾驶员反馈如何改进数据质量、地面上什么才算真正适合卡车、以及预订、实时数据和电动卡车创新的下一步是什么。系好安全带,我们出发吧。好的,Michael,很高兴你今天能来。你好吗?谢谢。我今天很好。你从慕尼黑一路来到柏林进行一些商务会议,对吧?当然也是为了录制这期节目。是的,很期待。在我们开始讨论Electro Trucker应用的所有事情之前,这是你目前的重点,让我们先了解一下Michael这个人的背景。你的背景是什么?谢谢。好的,所以我主要在德国长大,在此之前在美国呆过一段时间,但我在慕尼黑上大学,学的是政治学,完成后,我决定想要更多地了解这个世界,所以我开始学习物理,完成了物理学学士学位。那段时间非常有趣,压力也很大,我很享受。然后我
在2016年有一个很好的机会在Tesla慕尼黑办公室的超级充电团队实习,在那里度过了很好的一年。那时候我学到了很多关于电动出行的知识,Tesla当时正在快速发展。我对那段经历非常感激。之后我得到了一个机会在Porsche的斯图加特公司推进他们的全球目的地充电计划,主要是酒店和其他豪华位置的交流充电器。运营了三年也是一个很好的机会。然后我在Porsche担任所有电动车和混合动力车的车辆产品管理,也包括未来车型,指定充电性能、充电端口的位置、路线规划,所有这些有趣的东西。我对此非常感激。之后我想回到慕尼黑,找到了一个在NIO的机会,我也做产品管理,但更多是在生态系统方面,墙盒充电器、高功率
让我们先了解一下Michael这个人。你的背景是什么?谢谢。好的,所以我主要在德国长大,在此之前在美国呆过一段时间,但我在慕尼黑上大学,学的是政治学,完成后,我决定想要更多地了解这个世界,所以我开始学习物理,完成了物理学学士学位。那段时间非常有趣,压力也很大,我很享受。然后我
在2016年有一个很好的机会在Tesla慕尼黑办公室的超级充电团队实习,在那里度过了很好的一年。那时候我学到了很多关于电动出行的知识,Tesla当时正在快速发展。我对那段经历非常感激。之后我得到了一个机会在Porsche的斯图加特公司推进他们的全球目的地充电计划,主要是酒店和其他豪华位置的交流充电器。运营了三年也是一个很好的机会。
然后我在Porsche担任所有电动车和混合动力车的车辆产品管理,也包括未来车型,指定充电性能、充电端口的位置、路线规划,所有这些有趣的东西。我对此非常感激。之后我想回到慕尼黑,找到了一个在NIO的机会,我也做产品管理,但更多是在生态系统方面,墙盒充电器、高功率
powered charger,we'll maybe get into that stuff later. That was a great three years of my life, and now I'm off to new adventures with eTrucker. So,and how much would you say are you American, and to what extent? You have a certain definition for yourself? 我感觉自己是德国人,尽管我不是德国人,我是奥地利人、美国人和爱尔兰人。但是的,我感觉自己是德国人,
但我的父亲来自纽约,我也很享受在那里的时光。对。你在特斯拉的那段时间,你在2016年那里。你能详细说说那时的情况吗?我了解到那是在Model 3之前。如果你还记得的话,那些日子有什么挑战吗?所以,让人们了解我们。我的一个工作是在那里建立目的地充电网络,工作非常相似。给酒店打冷电话,向前台解释特斯拉是什么,我们生产电动汽车,通常他们都在阿尔卑斯山附近的某个地方,从未听说过电动汽车或特斯拉。所以要讲述这个故事,让人们相信电动出行是未来的方向。这也在某种程度上让我自己信服了,我也变得擅长推销这个概念。我们真的扩大了目的地充电网络,我在超级充电站网络方面也帮了一些忙。特别是那种专业精神和优化的程度,真正降低成本,那真的给我留下了深刻印象。我认为特斯拉超级充电站团队在过去几年所做的工作太棒了,真正无与伦比的网络。能够亲眼目睹这一切真是太好了。
destination charging network there as well, very similar work. Cold calling hotels, explaining to the front desk what Tesla is,we make electric cars,and usually they were somewhere in the Alps and hadn't heard about electric cars or Tesla at all. So explaining the story, convincing people of electric mobility and that it's the future. It kind of also convinced myself, and I got good
at pitching that. We really grew the destination charging network, and I also helped out with the supercharger network a little bit. Just the amount of professionalism and optimization, really cutting costs,that was really impressive. I think it's awesome what the Tesla supercharger team has done over the last few years,truly an unmatched network. Great to have had a front-row seat to that. Did you meet Elon Musk
or Philip Schroeder?
没有,就是一些欧洲的领导层,但当然那种精神氛围就在那里,埃隆某种程度上在每个人的脑海中。那里的精神真的很有感染力,能成为那个团队的一部分真的很棒。我仍然和他们中的很多人是朋友,这是一个很好的社区。那超级充电站网络的最新情况如何?有一个时期,我想是去年,埃隆,我想,想要以某种方式关闭它
还是你知道现在的状况或之后到底发生了什么?所以我的理解是,我想埃隆想用某个人来做个榜样,不幸的是那个人就是超级充电站团队。最后,我认为实际上这个故事比也许实际发生的事情要大得多,特别是在欧洲。我想是有裁员,但规模没有你在美国听到的那么大。但这很有趣
问题,OEM在充电行业中的角色。我认为这是每个汽车制造商都在努力解决的核心问题之一。许多制造商遵循了相似的游戏计划,许多人得出了相似的结论,现在可能在改变他们的方法。所以这总是一个有趣的问题。当你说改变方法时,你在想什么?所以曾经有Ionity,那种聚集在一起、建设基础设施、把基本的事情做对的情况。
然后总是有这样的问题,好的,你有自己的MSP吗,或者说移动服务提供商,或者本质上是充电卡。那的角色是什么,或者你们共享这些资源?然后我们看到在高端市场中越来越多这些高端充电休息室出现,越来越多来自保时捷和戴姆勒。我不认为每个人都确切知道长期角色会是什么样的,但肯定发生了很多事情,这是一个伟大的体验和学习的时机。然后谈到保时捷,在那些日子里你说你从事路线优化、目的地充电的工作。那是怎么回事?
是的,所以我是充电的产品经理。在车辆方面,Taycan是一辆非常特殊的车,当然。第一辆800伏的车,第一辆支持即插即充的车。第一辆车真的是,在开始时不太多,但后来
一个非常好的涡轮增压规划师,这就是我们所说的。把它做对,理解用户的需求,他们想看到什么,什么是好的路线,这个定义在软件中有点难以理解或定义。现在其中一些学习也转移到了我目前正在做的事情上,所以我真的很喜欢那个。但那时我们也必须想象未来会是什么样子,
充电速度会是什么。Taycan发布时是270千瓦峰值功率,我们无法想象300或400千瓦。现在一些中国车刚好配备500或更高的千瓦。所以想象未来真的很具有挑战性和有趣。但也关于支付,即插即充扮演什么角色,这些问题都很有趣。最后是
整个快速充电性能的话题。所以不仅仅是达到峰值速度,而是对电池进行预调节,确保所有事情都优化,这样你就能真正快速充电。因为每个人都说这取决于很多因素,这在某种程度上是真的。最后,只有电池温度和SOC才能真正决定它在适当充电器处的充电速度。是的,我们会回到这个问题。然后,在今天之前,可以说,蔚来,
你说生态系统,所以你能详细说明吗?据我了解,这特别是关于充电方面的工作。你主要看的是什么类型的挑战或话题?当然,一方面,从一个非常简单的交流家用充电器开始,让那个准备好,蔚来生产他们所有自己的充电器。实际上在武汉,有一个工厂生产充电器,让这些充电器获得认证并为欧洲市场做好准备,拥有
那里适当的应用程序和功能。我也早早决定把整个smart charging的话题从充电墙盒引出来,更多地进入车辆本身。我们开发了蔚来smart charging车辆功能。蔚来也是世界上最大的充电点运营商之一,在欧洲我们在北欧地区也拥有大约100个直流快速充电器。运营这些,让硬件做对,集成一个信用卡终端,那很有趣。还有在电池交换站,我们也在那里给电池充电,校准法这样的话题是相关的。所以你必须看这些你刚才提到的所有方面。当然,特别是拥有,蔚来有电池交换技术的角色,意味着车辆可以快速交换电池。
那如何改变车辆的需求,那相当有趣。当你说你更倾向于在车辆而不是交流充电器中看smart charging时,你的推理或理由是什么?所以蔚来smart charging背后的理由是我看到了一种方式,车辆可以真正利用动态电价来优化充电会话。基本上
通过两次点击,你只需在车辆中激活smart charging,设置出发时间或充电截止时间。车辆自动知道日前价格,选择一天中最便宜的小时来充电,那就是充电发生的时间。我们只是直接向车辆发送命令。没有设置,没有登录,没有需要为用户处理的令牌。他们只需要确保他们的电费关税是动态的,他们有一个智能电表,但基本上不管
他们有哪个能源提供商,因为动态电价主要遵循所有相同的日前信号。所以这是有道理的。但当你特别说你更倾向于通过车辆而不是蔚来正在制造的充电器来做时,你是什么意思?所以基本上如果我们通过车辆做,充电器能做什么真的不重要。它可以是任何制造商的哑充电器或非连接充电器。通过充电墙盒来做有一个挑战,就是交流充电的通信实际上相当有限。例如,充电器不知道车辆的充电状态是什么,因此不太知道汽车想要或需要多少能量,这限制了你能做的事情。现在有了ISO 15118和在未来也针对交流家用充电的强制,这将部分改变,但我们说,好的,我们可以快速在这里实现一个有真正价值的功能
然而,当你特别说你更倾向于通过车辆而不是蔚来正在建造的充电器来做时,你是什么意思?所以基本上如果我们通过车辆做,充电器能做什么真的不重要。它可以是来自任何制造商的哑充电器或非连接充电器。通过充电墙盒来做有一个挑战,就是交流充电的通信实际上相当有限。例如,充电器不知道车辆的充电状态,因此不太知道汽车想要或需要多少能量,这限制了你能做的事情。现在有了ISO 15118和未来也针对交流家用充电的强制,这将部分改变,但我们说,好的,我们可以快速在这里实现一个有真正价值的功能
盒子有一个挑战,就是交流充电的通信实际上相当有限。例如,充电器不知道车辆的充电状态,因此不太知道汽车想要或需要多少能量,这限制了你能做的事情。现在有了ISO 15118和未来也针对交流家用充电的强制,这将部分改变,但我们说,好的,我们可以快速在这里实现一个有真正价值的功能
我们的用户,尤其是北欧地区的用户,他们已经拥有动态电价和智能电表。我们就直接做了。开发和实现的成本并不高。价格数据随处可得。所以做起来真的很简单,解决了许多汽车制造商一直在努力解决的核心问题之一。是的,完全同意。有趣的是,让我们深入探讨一下。我认为许多人要么不知道,要么就算知道,
他们可能也不知道原因。所以确实,电池剩余电量,也就是你的电池还剩多少以及还能续航多少公里,在交流级别不会传输到充电墙盒,但在直流级别是会的。为什么会这样呢?你知道这背后的技术原因吗?ISO 15118什么时候才会在所有交流充电器中实现,如果有人没有蔚来车但想通过他们的充电墙盒查看剩余电量,他们什么时候能看到?
是的。交流充电今天的工作方式很简单,使用脉宽调制或PWM信号,基本上只有状态和充电电流可以从充电墙盒传输到车辆。所以车辆作为充电器,例如会说,好的,你可以用10安培充电。
实际上,你充电的相数也没有定义。车辆会根据获得的相数,1相或3相,随便接收多少。所以在交流充电期间,充电功率实际上也不会被明确传输,因为这样做的唯一目的是保护电线,要么是从充电器到车辆的电线,要么是家里从配电箱到充电器的电缆。这才是你想要保护的。所以你设置了最大
充电电流,这会传输给车辆。但车辆实际上是掌控者,通过车载充电器吸取能量。所以充电器实际上不能直接改变通过它的电量。它只是在监控正在发生的事情,万一车辆吸取过多电力,它可以关闭充电会话,但没有什么其他的。充电墙盒本质上只是车辆的适配器,内置一些安全功能
这就是它目前的工作方式。欧盟通过最近宣布的委托法案表示,从2027年起,家庭交流充电墙盒需要支持ISO 15118-20,这意味着现在有一个高级别的通信在进行,你可以双向发送数据包。你需要在充电器中增加一个额外的小调制解调器,这也会让它贵一些,当然
然后你需要实现这个软件栈。在蔚来,我们经历过交流充电协议对我们来说真的很容易实现,我们自己做的。现在有了15118,这不是交流充电器制造商能切实在内部做的事情。你需要依靠生态系统中的一些软件提供商来给你提供,或者你需要从他们那里购买。所以在硬件端和软件端
这确实让交流充电变得相当昂贵。所以我不是特别喜欢这个15118强制要求用于基础交流充电,尤其是考虑到如果你实际控制车辆,你也可以在那里做真正酷炫的智能充电功能。我想希望是最终所有家庭充电器都会变成双向的,所有车辆都会双向,这样就能解决我们所有的能源问题。但那是一个假设,不是
事实,他们决定这样强制规定是相当有趣的。关于你说的最后一点,你说交流充电器需要通过实现ISO 15118变得那么聪明,只是为了实现双向情况,对吧?那只能通过车辆实现。所以双向充电,当然你需要一种方式让车辆和充电器彼此通信。例如,充电器需要说,嘿,
现在我要你放电这个电量。这个消息在旧的通信协议中根本不存在。所以你需要这种高级别的通信。这实际上是双向充电的主要问题,充电墙盒中实际上什么都没有改变。它只是一根通过它的电线。所以是的,魔法发生在所有的通信中。你也想要安全,因为如果停电了,有人在电网上工作,
你不希望车辆突然开始向电网放电,而有人在接触电线。所以有很多安全标准和电网代码进入其中。是的,只是澄清一下:如果我现在在家有一个交流充电器,一辆双向车辆,那可能在放电,这叫车到负载。我认为有很多车辆在交流下可以放电,但只能对
一个设备放电。如果你想向你的家放电,或者想向电网放电,大的障碍是在充电器,充电器级别,有这种保护,来保护,可以说,电网免受不应该流动的电流,如果有停电的话,就像你说的,有人在电网上工作。这是一个大问题。但之后双向充电的软件栈实际上可能只在
车辆中,或者我说错了?你可以只在车辆中运行V2G或V2Home算法和软件,你真的不需要升级充电墙盒,是吗?我想ISO 15118目前的设置方式是充电器想要成为这种智能充电方法的中心,充电器,无论从什么
信号来源,可能来自家庭能源管理器或电网运营商,要求你向电网放电。当然,车辆需要与电网频率完全匹配。关于电网规范,你需要定义明确的行为:比如说,如果电网频率,在欧洲是50赫兹,偏差0.3赫兹会怎样?会持续多少秒?你应该怎么做?是
应该降低功率?还是应该完全关闭?因为如果多个设备在电网中行为不当,这会导致停电更加严重。这些电网规范是只在输电网层面还是也在配电网层面?主要是输电系统运营商负责维持其电网的频率,所以主要是他们负责购买和实施电网服务。所以在
这种情况下,是的,他们会负责这一块。但同时,我想他们也会向配电系统运营商委派一些责任,而配电系统运营商当然有额外的要求,因为他们不担心频率,但他们担心变压器过载之类的事情。回到你之前做的smart charging,你是否也考虑了太阳能的自消耗,还是
完全专注于日前现货市场优化?是的,日前优化是第一步。当然你也可以做太阳能优化充电,基本上可以用两种方式做太阳能优化充电。你可以让你的房子测量你的光伏发电量和房子电网消耗,以及你向电网出口多少功率,然后你可以开始充电来消耗这些功率。但我也研究了一种替代方案,因为这
当然需要大量的集成和知识共享。作为我硕士论文的一部分,我也研究了,你是否可以通过只查看专业的太阳能强度预报来获得相似的好结果。大型太阳能电池板运营商购买非常准确的太阳能预报,包括云层运动和风向,因为他们的工作是在日前市场上竞价
然后说,嘿,我将在未来的某个时间提供这么多功率。所以他们需要非常好的预报,我们在家里也可以用这些来对太阳能系统将产生多少功率进行相当好的估计。你可以对你自己房子的电网消耗做出某些假设,然后你会得到大约80%或90%的解决方案,这比什么都没有好得多。而
实际上对大多数人来说可能已经足够好了,问题是你想花多少额外的成本和工作来实现最后10%的优化。那么这个有实施吗?作为新用户,他们能激活这个功能吗?我们已经准备好做太阳能优化充电的计划,但我没有抽出时间来实施它。好的,你做动态现货价格功能真是很好,因为这也相当独特。我不
太确定,我不了解所有的原始设备制造商,但这听起来相当独特。我认为让我们能够做到这一点的是我们把自己排除在外。我们没有试图从这个功能中获得价值,我们没有试图通过这个功能赚钱,而那种事会蒙蔽你的视野,如果你的主要焦点是试图从每个功能中赚钱。我们反过来说,好的,我们能为
用户做什么来解决他的问题?我们找到了一个解决方案,真的很便宜易于实施,工作非常可靠,就这样做了。但当然它不能通过它赚钱,它解决一个问题。那么它被使用很多吗?是的,我们非常高兴在北欧地区每个人都拥有它。当然,价格变化没有我们在德国这里经历的那么大,但他们仍然用它节省了很多钱,而且
正如我所说,非常容易设置。任何人都可以做。而且它会记住你所在的位置,这个范围内的每个AC充电会话都会被smart charging优化,当然范围外的一切都不会。所以是的,管理起来非常容易。你也能量化司机节省了多少钱吗?我们计算了所谓的收益潜力,我们发现你可能能节省大约30%的电力成本,但正如我
所说,这是在北欧,定价变化,因为他们拥有相对一致的电力生产,没有德国的潜力那么大,但这里我们没有smart meters,所以那就是问题。德国该死的smart meters。但让我们不要涉及那个话题,还有很多其他更有趣的事情要讨论。还有电池交换,我也觉得那很有趣。我认为NIO可能是最主要的公司
在做这个。你能分享一下使用情况吗?你说有意思的是有AC墙壁盒,还有NIO有的HPC电缆,固定直流。是的,我们有一个500千瓦直流快速充电器,这真的是欧洲最快的充电器之一,是的,它们工作得很好。那么用户使用这些可交换电池比固定HPC多吗,举例来说?而且你如何看待NIO是
唯一一个真正推进这个概念并且其他原始设备制造商没有推进的?所以NIO通常在同一地点拥有电池交换和高功率充电,用户通常可以选择使用哪一个。而且确实,如果两者都可用,他们通常选择交换,就因为它快很多。这很有趣,而且运作得非常好。所以电池交换确实是一项伟大的技术。这是一个利基市场。我
不要期望每个制造商或每个人都需要它。有一定的用户群体,例如出租车,他们真的很喜欢它。对他们来说,它只是解决了很多问题,对他们来说这是正确的选择。我不认为欧洲的每一辆车都需要有它。但我也去过中国几次,那里当然电池互换就是一种生活方式。我认识那里的一些人
根本没有给他们的车充过电。他们只是互换电池,那里有很多换电站。是的,如果你真的有一个很好的网络,它就能运行。那么你如何看待其他OEM不跟风的情况呢?我完全理解。这确实在某种程度上限制了你能制造什么样的车、车辆的尺寸,而且确实增加了一点成本,但这并不妨碍
你进行快速充电。所以NIO车辆可以以240 kW的功率充电,即使在400 V系统上也是如此。所以你在快速充电方面绝对不必做出妥协。但对我来说,电池互换之所以如此有趣,是因为在电池互换后,你拥有一块空电池。问题是,你用那块空电池做什么?你立即给它充电,还是本质上使用我们为
汽车使用的相同算法,你进行智能充电。所以你等待电价下降,然后给你的车充电。所以你可以提供快速充电体验,但价格相当于交流电的价格。这真的很巧妙,你可以在对电网有利、价格便宜的时候使用能源。那么作为一名NIO驾驶员,如果我想在德国这里互换我的电池,价格实际上是多少?
是的,这也取决于地点和国家,但我认为在某些地区我们不到45欧分。这是一个相当有竞争力的价格。说到这个,你在一家美国公司工作过,一家西方世界电动汽车市场的领导者,然后你在保时捷工作,保时捷肯定以高性能著称,并打造了Taycan这款出色的电动汽车,然后是的,我们刚刚讨论过的NIO,代表一家创新的中国
厂商。周围还有更多,比如小米、比亚迪等等。那么你对OEM领导力格局的未来怎么看,可以这么说,特别是在电动汽车世界?是的,这些都是非常不同的经历。特斯拉某种程度上是特殊的。我认为这是一个独特的时刻。我不认为这很容易再现。我也不认为其他美国OEM是相似的。我想欧洲模式,
德国OEM之间存在某些相似之处,他们的思维方式、内部运作方式。你有很多保障,你知道基线是什么,你知道决定是什么,在某种程度上你可以依赖这一点。与中国汽车公司打交道时,决策速度更快,可能会日变,这使得出色的创新速度成为可能,这也很昂贵,但每次迭代都能使产品更好或更便宜,这真的非常难以竞争。我不认为所有中国OEM都是一样的。我认为初创公司和新进入者与更成熟的厂商之间可能存在很大差异,但总体而言,一个国家专注于电动出行真的释放了很大的潜力,而且这些汽车真的很不错。是的。那么现在让我们换个话题,谈论
你目前所处的下一阶段。是什么驱使你现在从NIO,我认为是2个月左右,转变并创办Electric Trucker应用或公司?公司的正式名称是什么?公司名称是Electra Trucker Media,但应用程序叫eTrucker。让我感到着迷的是充电在某个时刻会变得正常。这实际上是我在保时捷时意识到的:我们有一个充电产品经理,但我们没有一个加油产品经理。加油站之类的,没有必要在那里拥有专业知识。我不知道充电是否会走同样的路。它看起来确实很复杂,足以使得仍然有有趣的事情要做,而且我不认为在汽车方面我们已经解决了所有问题。但我看到了
进入重型卡车领域的机会,也带着可能不重复我们在乘用车上犯过的类似错误的意图,利用这些经验教训真正做得一次到位。这就是为什么我与Electric Trucker的托比亚斯·瓦格纳合作,我很幸运能与他一起创建eTrucker应用程序,还有我们的软件工程师马蒂亚斯·勃兰德。我们一起
决定了我们想要做什么。我们首先主要是为了帮助托比亚斯的日常工作而做的。他仍然是一名卡车司机,两周前他基本上一口气从土耳其开到了葡萄牙。eTrucker应用程序真的帮助了他的日常工作。这个应用程序告诉你何时到达某个充电站,以及它是在你的
剩余行驶时间内还是外。你可以按特定的CPO进行过滤,他还可以看到哪些位置实际上适合夜间充电,因为许多为卡车建造的基础设施和大功率充电器实际上是为白天45分钟的休息时间而建造的,你应该在充电后离开。但卡车司机也必须在晚上进行9小时或11小时的休息。我认为这是
更有趣的充电环节,因为这实际上是你比短休息期间充电更多能量的地方。所以再往后退一步,背景故事是什么,一切如何开始的?你是在某个活动中遇见托比亚斯的吗?是的,我们在E.ON Drive Summit上相遇,差不多一年多前。我们一拍即合,我问了一些正确的问题,
一切就这样开始了。我认为这是一个重要的时刻,因为我们都看到了卡车运输电气化中的问题,我认为这个问题需要被解决。所以这就是为什么我们决定推出eTrucker应用程序,专门为电动卡车司机设计。我们确实实施了这一点,现在我们正在改进它。我们也在与CPO合作,这样我们就可以提供最准确的信息。我们
也对其他卡车驾驶员进行了测试,反馈一直都很好。很多人说他们正在寻找这样的东西。所以我认为我们走在正确的道路上。现在的问题是如何扩展这个应用程序,使其不仅对电动卡车有用,而且对整个物流行业也很重要。这确实很有希望。现在让我们看看
我很感兴趣想了解它是如何运作的。我在导航系统、应用程序和移动服务提供商方面有一些经验。我们说,好的,让我们把这作为一个副业项目来做,看看会怎样,然后我们开始评估高功率充电站对卡车的适用性,把这些信息汇总在一起,开发了一款应用,然后就推出了。
这家公司是由你们三个创始人建立的。所以托比亚斯仍然在他的卡车司机岗位上,显然用他非常实际的经验来帮助我们,马蒂亚斯是另一位联合创始人。你们现在都全身心投入,试图通过自我融资来推进,靠储蓄生活来维持运营,对吧?我们现在的支出不是很多。当然我们有
想提供优质的体验。这就是为什么我们使用非常好的地图,我们使用谷歌地图,比如,因为他们有非常高质量的卫星影像,我们认为这对卡车司机来说很重要,他们可以直观地确认是的,那里有足够的空间来充电或者在充电后停放,相比之下其他地图提供商比如开放街道地图就不一样了。如果你没有卫星图像视图,你会错过很多有助于
增加对充电会成功的信心的背景信息。我们也使用TomTom来获得非常好的卡车特定路线,所以我们可以准确告诉你用卡车到达的时间。在某些国家,你只能以80或90公里/小时的速度行驶,我们也考虑到了这一点,以及你必须采取的路线,以提供最佳建议和可视化
效果。所以这要花费一些成本,但对我们来说是值得的。为了详细理解这个问题:如果我现在是一个卡车司机,想要驾驶电动卡车,我面临的关键问题是什么,你们试图解决什么?前三个问题,如果你想详细说明的话。运输业已经发展到现在我们已经有相当不错的电动卡车了,尽管对于其中一些公司来说
这是他们重型卡车的第一或第二代。它们实际上功能相当强大,我们经常看到它们被用在相对单调的路线上,点对点,每天同样的路线。这也很有挑战性,你需要充电解决方案。你要么需要在起点或终点建造充电站,要么你必须找到一个中途充电站,每天都去那里充电。这非常有规律,非常可预测。在这种情况下,我们的应用会
可能帮助你确定你通常使用的充电器是否被占用。但我认为更有趣的是,托比亚斯正在开创的,是这个长途运输领域,许多人认为还没有准备好用电动卡车。但我们实际上相信这正是电动卡车能最好地展现优势的地方,有更低的运营成本,能在稍微更好的
昂贵的电动卡车,你需要驾驶很多公里,而驾驶里程最多的卡车是长途卡车。所以我们想要开放这个领域,使其成为可能,给卡车司机提供成功所需的合适工具,我们相信eTrucker应用程序就是他们需要的工具,这样他们就永远不用担心,总能找到适合他们情况的充电器。所以再说一遍非常具体的情况,对不起,如果我试图
真正说清楚这一点,但如果我是一名卡车司机,你在向我推销你的解决方案,那么我的问题是什么,如果我有一辆来自MAN或任何其他原始设备制造商的卡车,我为什么需要你呢。
实际上我们发现,即使对于柴油卡车,许多卡车司机也不会真正使用卡车上的导航系统。他们要么使用平板电脑或手机来获取其他导航解决方案,通常也来自物流公司本身,或者是集成在车辆中的平板电脑。大多数这些卡车的车载导航系统在关于卡车可以在哪里充电的兴趣点数据方面都不是很好。这是我们正在解决的主要痛点,通过
给他或她提供非常清晰的关于他们可以去哪里充电的说明。而且它真的很容易操作,只有一层,真的很大的按钮,以及关于你在哪里的很好的概览。所以你回答我问题的方式是:如果我需要从A点运送东西到B点,你回答我应该在哪里充电。这也是我们注意到的事情之一,即
司机有多少自主权或责任方面有很大的差异。我们看到一些物流公司为卡车司机定义了一切,他们确切需要在哪里,他们将在哪里充电,他们将走什么路线。也许他们优化了这一点,他们有充分的理由提出这样的建议。另一方面,我们看到一些物流公司大致会告诉你需要在某个地方到达的时间,但你如何到达
那里有点由你决定。我们看到的,以及有我们在这里的好处,是展示这一天是多么不可预测。你知道,如果你遇到交通堵塞或者需要改路,所有最好的计划都会被打破,而拥有一个好的、强大的eTrucker应用程序来帮助你解决这些情况,我们相信会带来很大的价值,而且
只是为大多数物流公司开放了长途卡车运输。所以你说的大问题之一是,当你想帮助我理解在哪里充电时,就是要理解哪些场站是卡车友好的,可以这么说,对吧?所以这就是你给我的答案,对我来说最好的场站是什么,哪些是卡车友好的。是的,所以我们把卡车友好定义为至少在现场有足够的空间来停泊你的拖车,分离,
然后去充电站充电。这是最低要求。如果现场没有停放拖车的地方,我们通常不会考虑那个。当然,在前往充电器的路上,你也不能通过禁止卡车通行的道路。而且通常要么有重量限制,要么有高度限制,这会阻止你使用特定的充电器。
所以我们把所有这些都考虑在内。我们在选择包含的站点时也确实非常谨慎。我们不想包括任何可能有行人或儿童,或交通繁忙的站点。我们认为这些站点不适合卡车,不想把任何卡车路由到那里。但我们发现实际上相当多的站点是适合卡车的。当然,我们也包括所有的站点
那些不需要断开连接的站点,某种意义上的直通式停靠点。即使你只激活直通式停靠点的过滤器,你仍然可以相当轻松地在整个欧洲从A点到达B点。当然,优化的挑战在于你想找到一个尽可能靠近驾驶时间班次结束的充电器。所以当你开始驾驶时,你可以驾驶4.5小时。你想要找到一个位于
4小时10分钟到4小时30分钟之间的充电器,不能超过,但也不能少太多,因为那样你就是在浪费时间。所以真正拥有这些选择能帮助卡车司机实现与柴油卡车相同的性能。关键方面是,一方面要了解哪些站点对卡车友好,另一方面要了解哪些站点沿着我的路线且对卡车友好,并且能够符合驾驶限制,那4.5小时,之后你
需要休息,然后还有每日和每周限制,对吧?是的,所以那是最重要的。我们还有长停留过滤器,你可以说,好的,这是一个你可以在那里过夜、停留9或11小时、在那里充电并且不用担心任何事情的位置。所以这些是我们认为最重要的事情。这就是我们围绕此建立的数据模型
它实际上并不完全符合这个OCPI数据模型,你在其中描述充电位置,这是MSP用来与充电点运营商沟通的商定标准。所以,是的。好的,我想这很清楚,你们提供的解决方案,我们已经有点涉及了,所以这是一个导航工具、一个地图,比如TomTom和谷歌地图,然后我们还有这个充电
点数据。然后我想我看过一篇关于EcoMovement的文章,对吧,你们获得了这些数据,然后把它们结合在一起,然后作为司机,我可以轻松地说我需要从A点到B点。你们告诉我在哪里充电最好,我还可以自己设置一些更多的过滤器,对吧?是的,所以目前我们不是真的在告诉你,好的,这个特定的充电器是你必须去的。我们更多是向你展示
沿着你路线的所有选择,这样你可以做出最佳决定。你知道,对我们来说,卡车司机是专业人士。他们擅长自己的工作。我们相信为他们提供正确的工具来成功是最好的前进方向。对我们来说,很好的是我们也可以依靠一个社区。我们非常重视这个POI数据话题。我们在EcoMovement有一个很棒的合作伙伴,他们为我们提供
一个很好的充电器位置基础数据层。他们为我们提供实时占用数据,在此基础上我们添加我们的属性。实际上,卡车司机社区正在帮助建立这个。所以在每个充电器上,如果你打开它,你可以某种程度上报告一个错误,但你也可以升级一个充电器,因为我们知道每个直流充电器在哪里。你只需点击它,说,嘿,实际上,我认为这是一个用于
卡车的直流充电器。然后我们看一下,如果Tobias和我都同意它对卡车兼容,我们就将其添加到主地图。我们也指出很多我们认为卡车充电可能存在的位置,然后我们有一个社区反馈模式,你可以进入并说,嘿,实际上,我去过那个充电器,不,它不对卡车兼容。让我告诉他们这一点,然后我们
把它移除或者我们把它作为卡车充电器添加。有趣的是,我还看到了一些关于芯片的东西,你怎么称呼它,e-trucker芯片。是的,是的,你能详细说明一下吗?所以卡车运输的支付方式目前的运作方式,这是一个相当有趣的领域,我们很想参与其中,是物流公司通常会与特定的充电点运营商达成协议,以换取一定的容量承诺
千瓦时。物流公司,如果他们有几辆卡车,实际上是在谈论他们可能在公共场所充电的数百万千瓦时。所以有一些杠杆可以协商价格。这通常意味着你从那个充电点运营商那里获得一张充电卡,你把它放在卡车里,卡车司机将使用它来在那里充电。但如果你对两个或三个不同的
充电点运营商这样做,那么你就开始得到两三张RFID卡。然后也许再为你的仓库充电器添加几张,在你自己的家庭仓库或也在一些仓库共享机会中。然后我们陷入了与卡片相似的情况,你有十张不同的RFID卡,每一个拿错卡的错误实际上可能是一个非常昂贵的错误,因为你充电最多500千瓦时,用
错误的价格充电会使整个路线可能无利可图。是的,那是一个相当大的成本。是的,所以e-trucker芯片允许我们的是可能将其中一些卡结合在一起,所以你可以告诉我们经常使用的物流公司,嘿,你不需要给我另一张卡。这是我已经在车辆中的令牌。请将其添加到你的系统中并让我在那里充电
那个。同样的方式也适用于更大的充电点运营商,你可以告诉他们,嘿,这是我正在使用的卡,请将其添加到你的系统中,然后之后给我发送账单。这只是,也许这是一个愚蠢的问题,这难道不是MSP模式吗?目前e-trucker芯片不是MSP。我们不参与交易。我们本质上只是提供可以在不同系统中注册的物理卡,但
这是我们正在研究的一个领域,MSP在卡车运输中扮演什么角色。这是一个非常有趣的问题,我们现在正在努力解决这个问题,因为我们有这两个极端。一方面,物流公司希望灵活地选择合适的充电器,在合适的地点,以优化他们的行驶时间。另一方面,他们愿意放弃一些灵活性,并将千瓦时承诺给某些充电点运营商,以换取
显著更低的价格。这种有趣的相互作用是我们正在研究的领域,看MSP或支付解决方案总体上可能扮演什么角色。有道理。那么你的意图是什么,你想成为什么样的参与者,你会怎么称呼自己?是像路线优化应用程序、导航应用程序吗?你最终想成为支付服务吗?商业模式会是什么样的?是的,我们从
驾驶员的角度来看,然后从物流公司的角度进行扩展,他们需要什么才能成功使用电动卡车,以及他们需要的任何东西。无论我们在哪里找到机会,那就是我们要提供的。目前是带有人工验证的POI数据的地图,针对每个我们认为现在很有价值的单独充电器。尽管应用程序是免费的,任何人都可以直接去应用商店下载
e-Trucker应用程序,甚至只是作为一个汽车驾驶员,说,嘿,我想成为e-Trucker社区的一部分,验证一个位置。所以那部分将永远是免费的。但是这种你需要的灵活性和作为物流公司你愿意放弃的灵活性之间的相互作用,以实现收支平衡或盈利,这是我们未来想要帮助物流公司的地方。听起来很有趣,而我们
我们提到了一些你必须与之合作的利益相关者。我认为在德语中,Spedition是货运代理,我认为在英语中是对的?当然,驾驶员是必不可少的,但你是否也需要与货运公司协调,或者这对你的应用程序不相关?是的,我们看到来自双方的不同解决方案。所以来自货运公司或一般物流公司的方面,
真正集中为驾驶员规划路线并建议他们在哪里充电。而现在我们从另一个角度来看,说,好吧,实际上如果驾驶员自己负责,特别是你总是有问题,即使是最好的计划,即使你有备用计划,事情也会出错。那就是,每个人都有计划,直到他被打到脸。是的,完全同意,这就是我们看到的,
这就是托比亚斯每周在他的视频中向我们展示的内容,是的,在这个领域很令人兴奋。好的,那么这个想法是,所以货运公司必须从A点运送东西到B点,所以可能有不同的物流公司或物流公司的客户可以设置充电器。这对你来说是一个相关的利益相关者吗,
还是你只看公共充电器,更多是充电点运营商和公共充电器?不,我们确实看到私人仓库充电可能比公共充电便宜一些。而我们永远不能忘记的是,物流公司真的关心每千瓦时的价格是多少。如果他们能省几分钱,这通常就是会发生的事情。
所以如果我们能找到他们可以更便宜充电的仓库,那就是我们要去的地方。目前我们在应用程序中确实包括仓库充电器。我们标记它们说,嘿,你实际上需要在去那里之前注册,并与仓库签订合同。但是如果你每天都经过其中一个仓库,知道那里会有很好的充电机会就太好了
所以我们想成为一个平台,让物流公司和充电点运营商,或者这些有仓库充电器的仓库,能够聚集在一起,找到最优路线,因为这真的就是我们在这里的目的。我们只是想让电动卡车成为欧洲的现实。有道理。而且你相当快地构建了这个产品。我不知道你花了多长时间来构建这个应用程序。所以马蒂亚斯是一位很棒的软件开发者,他真的
以超快的速度和极高的质量创建了它。它工作得非常好。但当然,我们也不想把事情复杂化。我们专注于真正增加价值的东西,我们包括那个,然后删除其余所有内容,所以这使我们现在能够相当敏捷。你现在有多少用户,他们是如何找到你的?所以我们现在有超过8000次下载,这大大超过了我的预期
太多了。所以真正很棒的是,他们中的大多数只是e-Trucker社区的一部分,也驾驶普通卡车。但我们也看到了来自那些用拖车去度假的人的很大兴趣,所以普通汽车,但带着Wohnwagen,他们需要类似的充电器。所以我们在应用程序上也有很多这样的用户,
是的,只是人们对不同的充电器提供反馈,这就是我们所感谢的。我们每天收到多达20条反馈,验证充电器,向我们展示新的,并告诉我们哪些不是真正适合卡车的,所以我们非常感谢。通常你想通过口碑增长,还是托比亚斯实际上用他的视频,我想也非常好地获得新
用户找到你,或者你也有一个策略来获得更多用户?是的,所以我们现在更专注于让其他物流公司加入。我们希望用户较少,但确实是高价值用户,因为使用e-Trucker应用程序,我们实际上控制着数千千瓦时的流量。所以每个用户或卡车驾驶员对我们来说都很有价值。
我们非常感谢所有使用它的人,他们也有机会通过提供反馈来回馈。是的,这是有道理的。你知道像Zenda的Juna这样的新进入者是否会是有趣的选择,他们会成为你的合作伙伴吗,你怎么看待这个?我们绝对对任何形式的合作都持开放态度,我们也通过合作伙伴EcoMovement提供POI数据。所以你可以联系EcoMovement来申请eTrucker数据,然后你可以在自己的前端或应用中使用它。这样我们就是在与任何可能需要它的人分享。
好的。让我们稍微放大一下长途卡车运输市场,你能分享一些数字吗,比如有多少长途卡车,有多少是电动的,也许还能按地理位置区分一下?是的,这总是工作中有趣的一部分,一种现实检查。当然,如果你只看Tobias的视频,你会觉得电动卡车已经到来,它可以工作,一切都很好,为什么不是每个人都这样做呢?但与物流公司交谈,是的,这给了你一个现实检查,让你明白,好吧,有一些考虑因素和一些可能是想象出来的电动卡车的缺点需要解决,这些地方需要进行教育。
比如,你对电动卡车的主要异议是什么?最常见的异议是它们不适合长途卡车运输,只适合点对点运输。是的,那是主要的,充电速度。还有很多参与者也在呼吁建立兆瓦充电系统,或者MCS插头,具有更高的充电功率。他们说,是的,我们需要先把这些充电器装在地上,然后才能考虑电动卡车。我们不认为这是真的,我认为Tobias每周都在证明它可以工作。可能存在一些MCS兆瓦充电的使用案例,但我们真的还没有找到。所以我们只是在揭穿这个说法。为什么
你认为开始时不需要获得兆瓦充电,如果某个卡车司机或货运代理在听这个呢?是的,所以,假设你可以在一夜间充电,一辆卡车在白天开始,以80或90公里每小时的速度行驶4.5小时。这让你的一辆大卡车的电池电量达到大约40%的SOC,以奔驰Actros 600为例,是的,
这4.5小时后还没有空。如果你接入,比如说,250、300,甚至400千瓦的功率,你就能恢复到大约70%,然后你只被允许再行驶4.5小时。你根本不能在一天内耗尽电池,这真的不会发生。你唯一需要做的是使用eTrucker应用,激活夜间停泊过滤器,找到
一个可以在一夜间充电的地方。然后你可以每天都这样做,真的没有理由为什么它不应该工作。所以,如我所说,400千瓦的功率已经足够了。我想看到的是,在eTrucker应用中,我们也记录下电缆是否是冷却的或非冷却的,这对物流公司来说真的没有多大区别,但是
液冷电缆真的很棒。它们可以在卡车可能充电的整个小时内保持功率。但当然,它们也产生大量热废物,因为电缆,铜线,实际上要薄得多。非冷却电缆也很不错,因为它们没有这些损失。当然,也许在10-15分钟后,它们可能会进入降额状态,你需要降低充电功率,
但即使这些在大多数情况下也完全适合45分钟的充电会话。所以回到最初的问题,欧洲有多少长途卡车,有多少是电动的?是的,所以现在,我不知道确切的数字,但我们在应用中看到有一百多个卡车司机,他们有点像电动卡车司机的使用情况。我们看到
它每天都在增长。我认为新卡车销售实际上相当偏向电动。我们希望这一趋势继续,这些卡车也将获得长途卡车的完整能力。我认为到2030年,30%的新卡车销售将是电动的。我不确定你是否熟悉这个数据,这里在德国,或者
在欧洲,是吗?我对确切的数字有点模糊,但类似的东西。我想知道他们在到达30%的长途卡车之前是否更多地分解为配送卡车,还是这是你有信心也会在长途中发生的事情?所以,目前,也许我生活在这个泡沫中,但我相信会变得明显和清楚,电动卡车的运营成本更便宜。我认为是的
但这些数字也许是对那些不太熟悉的人,在什么方面它今天已经更便宜了。所以当然卡车的成本稍微高一点,但电力就是比柴油便宜,即使是高度补贴的柴油。所以电动卡车已经有了轻微的优势,现在这一切取决于你驾驶多少公里来真正利用那个优势。
Tobias有几个视频详细分解了欧元的确切数字。我们确实相信这是一个临界点。所以一旦你达到这个点,对于每个国家来说可能不同,如果达到了临界点,物流公司就没有真正的理由继续购买新的柴油卡车。电动卡车如果只在其容量内服役几年,就会更快地被淘汰。
几年,然后被淘汰。所以到2030年或2032年左右,我们将经历整个车队几乎完整的一次翻新。所以向完全电动的过渡可能比乘用车快得多,因为情感因素的影响较小,我们现在的工作就是清除所有的路障,澄清所有的误解,以及
我们现在正在做的工作就是清除所有的路障,澄清所有的误解,以及
clear all of this up. So I just think it's going to take a bit of time, but it's definitely inevitable in the commercial space.
让经济自然发展。是的,从长期来看,无论你如何定义或它是如何被定义的,这不仅仅是一个国家的事情,对吧?所以从第一天起,你就已经在国际范围内使用你的应用了。实际上,这周我们还为西班牙、葡萄牙、英国、比利时和罗马尼亚推出了地图,除了我们已有的网络,所以我们基本上覆盖了整个欧洲
现在。当然,我们想一步一步地做,因为,如我所说,我们手动验证每个位置,我们不想显示任何未经手动验证的位置,所以逐一验证每个位置花了一些时间。但是是的,我们真的很高兴终于完全覆盖了欧洲。暂时我们不计划超出这个范围。回到你与卡车司机或货运代理交谈时听到的反对意见
,你说续航里程是他们提出的一个话题,我们已经讨论过了以及如何解决它。还有其他主要问题吗?基本上就是充电网络。所以续航里程和充电网络有点相关联,但如我所说,你需要在每天驾驶时间结束时找到一个位置。所以是的,你确实需要一个相当紧密的
网络。但你不需要完全专用的卡车充电站。我们很高兴它们正在上线,当然如果我们有越来越多的电动卡车,我们就需要更大的站点。我更倾向于拥有较少但较大的站点。这也是我在特斯拉时间里学到的一个经验教训,拥有较少但较大的站点更聪明,我认为他们在理解排队论方面确实是先驱
排队论描述的是根据你有多少个服务器或充电器而产生的平均等待时间。这是我想看到的,这些真正的大型中央枢纽。我们不需要那么多,但是是的。我们还需要讨论价格。我想在某个时刻充电对CPO来说是有利可图的,我认为这很公平。我们需要
至少给他们一个机会在合理的时间内变得有利可图。仅仅呼吁更便宜的充电而不考虑背后的成本,这真的不会是一个长期的解决方案。我不是真正削价竞争的粉丝,我是优化成本的大粉丝,确保你廉价有效地建造,不犯
错误。这是特斯拉做得非常非常好的事情,这就是为什么今天他们仍然能提供一些最优价格的原因。不幸的是,没有特斯拉超级充电器是与卡车兼容的。电缆有点太短了,而且超级充电器柜只能达到500伏,而基本上所有的卡车都是800伏车辆。这有点阻止了这个,但还有足够的其他
充电器可以达到1000伏。我实际上现在不介意了。我认为奔驰现在推出了没有800伏选项的CLA,至少那是他们宣布的,然后由于反对意见他们改变了主意,但是是的,你可以用1000伏通过欧洲,没问题。有趣。在其他国家,即使你是最乐观的电动卡车手,你会说是的,这是不可能的,这有点是最大的眼界开阔的事情。我至少几乎去过了,有时也亲自访问过,这些国家的每一个,看了他们如何建造高功率充电器。你说得对,有很大的差异,但实际上不是你可能期望的国家。
托比亚斯两周前去土耳其的旅行令人惊讶,基础设施有多好,有多少充电器,以及它们的功率有多强
他们出奇地好,还有北欧国家,他们也有真正好的网络。但你当然也看到,有些国家空间是稀缺资源,德国、瑞士,他们没有那么多空间,这变得更加困难。西班牙,当然,现在是我最喜欢的卡车运输国家。我认为他们有一个很好的网络,他们有那么多空间。西班牙真的非常好。
英国,令人惊讶的是,不那么好。没有那么多好的充电器,道路非常狭窄,卡车的空间非常小。我现在对英国有点担心。荷兰也是,没有那么多空间,很多较老的硬件,因为他们起步早一点,这只是意味着你有一些较老的遗留硬件。是的,那是有道理的。谈到价格,你
已经暗示过了,那就是关键,总拥有成本。你遇到的CPO之间的价格差异是多少,范围或平均是多少?所以我们看到,你需要包括或排除增值税,但当然范围从每度电39美分到某些情况下80美分。80美分根本没有意义,是的,对不起,总价,对吧,这只是,你知道,真的不行。它可能对只是充电可能60度的乘用车有效,但如果你充电500度电,差别就很大了。作为一个行业或生态系统,我们还没有真正找到完美的解决方案,但我认为我们有合适的人在做这件事,现在的动力真的很大。我们看到很多来自充电点运营商的兴趣,
使他们的站点更加卡车友好,也可能为卡车提供商业优惠。所以我们把这看作是一个非常积极的发展,我们想帮助他们使充电站的投资回收期更快。是的,那是有道理的。就电池中的度电而言,你见过的电池大小是多少?长途卡车的可用电池能量从500到600度电不等,有些甚至更多。当然,这是一个有趣的话题,实际上很难确切地说电池中有多少能量。这有点取决于你如何放电、放电速度、温度,以及你实际上何时停止放电。这决定了你究竟能提取多少度电。是的,但这并不重要,因为,你知道,
长途卡车的可用电池能量从500到600度电不等,有些甚至还要多一些。当然,这是其中一个有趣的话题,实际上很难准确地说电池中究竟有多少能量。这取决于你如何放电、放电速度有多快、温度如何,以及你实际上何时停止放电。这决定了你究竟能够提取多少度电。是的,但这并不重要,因为,你知道,
这根本不重要,因为你知道,
这些电池太大了,续航里程也很棒。大概是每公里1度电,这是我们一直看到的情况,这让计算变得非常容易。我们会看到的,也许冬天会增加一点,但这就是现在的情况。如果关注一下仓库充电,你现在监控的大多数卡车司机,就像你从托比的视频和
纳诺·詹森能看到的那样,他们在仓库有大量的充电基础设施。对于电动卡车司机来说,现在能够总是依靠自己公司的仓库进行充电是很普遍的吗?是的,通常物流公司会从这个问题开始,我如何在我的仓库增加充电器?他们很快就会遇到电网容量的问题,这可能会是一个
问题。然后你会看到一些公司说,好吧,我们就是这样做,也许还会用较低的电网容量。比如,这些物流公司的典型电网容量有多大?这取决于该地点的历史。如果它历史上一直是大型工业区,他们可能有很多多余的容量,但通常没有那么多,在很多情况下,你可能只能增加100或200
千瓦的功率。那么问题就是,电池缓冲扮演什么角色?我假设可能有其他人对此更了解,但这不是电网容量的一一对应替代。而且主要是直流充电,对吧,即使在仓库也是,不是交流?是的,我们几乎看不到卡车的交流充电了。我想这很好。我不认为这个趋势会转移到乘用车上,
但对于卡车来说,这种做法是有道理的。在充电器方面,有没有一个主导的硬件品牌,我们到处都看到Alpitronic。这是首选品牌吗?仓库通常使用Kempower,我认为那是一个非常知名的品牌,是的。还有一件非常有趣的事是查看历史视频和地点图片。我会查看每个单独的充电站点,通常在谷歌上你可以看到三四年前的历史
图片,你会看到各种各样的充电器在那里被使用。但当你看到最新的图片时,通常你确实会看到一个Alpitronic HyperCharger在那里。我有点害怕他们替换了多少其他充电硬件,我以为至少是不错的充电器硬件,即使是那些在很多情况下也被替换了。我想这没问题。我也确实看到了一个很大的趋势
朝向这类分布式系统发展,你有一个中央电源柜和多个充电枪,有点像Kempower一直在做的。我认为那种电子版本也会表现得很好,但我们也看到,作为一个卡车司机,我们希望有一些可预测性。对于卡车来说,如果你要去一个400千瓦的充电器或一个400千瓦的Hypercharger,这会有很大的区别。你真的不知道,我
会不会得到400千瓦,或者有人会在我旁边接上,我只会得到200千瓦?当你只得到200千瓦时,也许你需要多充几分钟,有点超过法律规定的45分钟休息时间,才能真正达到一个你满意的电量百分比,然后继续行驶。所以这是其中一个问题。但另一方面,我很高兴看到那么多
Alpitronic充电器,因为他们已经被证明是相当可靠的。这当然是最坏的情况,如果你作为卡车司机去一个充电器,它不工作,但你没有剩余的行驶时间了。你有点被困在那里。你需要等45分钟,然后你可以开始寻找一个充电器,然后你需要再充45分钟。所以这是我们尝试用应用程序避免的最坏情况。
如果你知道,既然我们在讨论充电行业,该行业非常意识到这一点,我认为一些驾驶员也是如此。在可靠性方面存在一些问题,这就是为什么Alpitronic赢得了这么多市场份额,因为他们以非常可靠而闻名。是什么造就了他们的可靠性?他们比其他人做得更好的是什么?实际上,回到我之前提到的内容,这
软件,他们是少数真正在内部开发大量软件堆栈的制造商之一,包括ISO 15118软件堆栈。他们在这方面确实有专业知识。他们当然也有一个巨大的团队,这是你能够在内部完成这项工作所需的,但这显然会转化为更高的可靠性。即使我必须说我不是用户界面的大粉丝。我仍然不明白为什么
作为用户,我需要选择我正在使用的插头,我已经插进去了。这是充电器可以自动识别的东西。我不知道他们为什么不改变这一点。好的。在充电运营商方面,根据到目前为止所有的分析,有没有一些你更喜欢的或你认为更好的?我是说,我们真的对所有Ionity充电器感到兴奋,因为我们知道他们都有300
或350千瓦。他们都有液冷电缆。这有点有趣,因为现在Ionity也有这些混合地点,例如,一个ABB液冷充电器有350千瓦和一个Hypercharger 400,通常没有液冷电缆。对于卡车司机来说,他们需要做出决定使用哪一个,我主要建议他们坚持使用350千瓦液冷充电器,不要去略微更强大的400千瓦
充电器,因为功率会下降,有很大的风险是有人在你旁边接上,你只会得到200千瓦。是的,负载管理,这是很多人可能不知道或不太熟悉的东西,他们想知道为什么他们没有得到预期的全部功率。也许可以向听众解释一下:总是有现场负载管理,对吧?也许你可以详细说明一下是什么类型
到目前为止发现的各种策略。这是我们非常认真对待的问题。从第一天起,我们就一直在数据库中添加这些内容:该站点的负载管理是什么,以及最大充电功率是多少,我能依赖多少功率?我们有三个等级:高负载管理,意味着你很可能会得到明显较低的功率,或低负载管理,意味着
你几乎确保能获得该功率。高功率充电站通常带有负载管理,如果是中央管理的单功率柜配多个充电枪的设置。功率柜的功率定义了最大充电速度,连接到同一功率柜的人越多,功率就越低。电网连接通常与中央功率柜的功率相匹配。如果你有多个中央功率柜和多个
系统,它们之间可能也在进行负载管理,这样它们实际上不能同时以满功率运行每个功率柜。就像你拥有来自Alpitronic等制造商的一体化系统一样,如果你有10个充电器,每个400千瓦,它们不能同时以那个功率运行。这有点浪费,因为现场的交流-直流功率转换器
无法被充分利用。这就是为什么卫星系统(一个中央功率柜)有优势,因为你只需要恰好与电网连接相应数量的交流/直流转换器。是的,有时充电点运营商也会进行削峰,不仅是为了保护电网连接点的断路器限制,也是为了节省他们必须支付的峰值费用,也就是DSO,对吧?是的,如果他们聪明的话,他们会
在那里安装削峰限制器。但对于CPO来说,当然问题是:我实际上应该把限制设在哪里?因为如果我预期该站点会经常满占用,我可能应该愿意为全部电网费用付费。如果我认为那是个意外,我实际上不认为今年其他时间会出现一切都被使用的情况
同时,那么即使我可以,即使有电网连接,即使一切都准备好了,给用户供电也没有意义。但如果你进行削峰,你就不会给用户尽可能多的功率,因为你试图省钱。我认为还有一个有趣的区别,就是卡车和乘用车之间的差异。所以知道从
350千瓦Ionity或其他充电运营商能获得的充电峰值的电动车驾驶员,他们很少达到,或在目前根本达不到。大多数车辆仍然受限于车载电子设备,对吧。所以你有一个400伏系统,它通常能获得,我认为保时捷是第一个800伏的车型,但实际上电池的电压
对汽车充电速度没有任何作用。唯一重要的是电池温度和SoC。电压的唯一意义基本上就是从充电器到车辆的充电线是否会成为限制因素。因为这些线缆通常,如果未经冷却,短时间内只能处理高达500安培的电流。这正是800伏系统的优势
是,使用合适的充电器,你可以持续进行500安培的充电。这就是我们看到发生的情况。这让你达到将近400千瓦,这也是大多数卡车实际上的拉取功率。但功率不是电流和电压的乘积吗?所以如果你有800伏,你会有400伏的两倍。所以如果你有800伏,你可以用一半的充电
电流获得相同的充电功率。限制因素,电流会是一半,是的,当然。限制因素通常是从充电器到车辆的充电线缆。在那里,如果你有一条未冷却的线缆,拥有800伏系统会有很大帮助。卡车的线缆比乘用车大,这就是为什么它们能以那些高功率水平充电。卡车可以达到400千瓦。他们实际上可以达到更高。所以400千瓦
对卡车电池来说不是真正的挑战,因为如果总能量容量是600千瓦时,C倍率,即充电功率与电池容量的比率,不会很高。所以他们可能也能以800千瓦的功率充电。这样就开始变得有趣了,这很好,因为这意味着在卡车充电前你实际上不需要对电池进行预处理。乘用车需要非常小心地
将温度提升到目标温度,所以你需要预热电池,这实际上浪费了相当多的能量。然后你插入,它可以非常快地充电,但如果充电非常快,也会有很多损耗,然后你需要再次冷却电池。所以你加热电池的一切,之后都必须再冷却一遍。卡车很好,你不需要真正进行预处理
而且总是可以相当快速地充电。因为如果你在低温下为电池充电,电池管理系统根本不会允许高电流,你会被困在低充电功率上,因为如果电池管理系统不限制功率,电池会被损坏。是的,所以这就是预处理的全部内容:一方面你避免损坏电池,另一方面你使电池能够以更高的电流和
因此更高的功率充电,这是一个重大话题。我认为在我之前看的一个视频中,它也在查看每个OEM是如何制定预处理逻辑的工作方式,这是OEM决定的事情。作为用户,你没有那么大的灵活性。我认为这会影响卡车司机在他的日常工作中
好的,这个预调节在规划中是如何工作的。正如我所说,卡车不需要太多预调节,因为充电功率相比总电池容量来说并不是很大。但我发现非常有趣的一点是,大多数卡车都有限制充电功率的方法,通常默认设置就是以较低功率充电,你需要单独点击一个按钮才能解锁全功率。我不太确定这是
出于电池寿命的考虑,还是因为负载管理他们认为这样更容易,但这是需要注意的。如果你的卡车充电速度没有你期望的那么快,检查一下是否是这个问题。关于每个卡车司机的行程,我应该如何理解?每周的行程是固定的吗,还是说,我的意思是,有时你会在托比的视频中看到这周的变化,那么这个计划多久被打破一次呢,比如:哦,有一个新订单来了。
托比做的事情相对来说代表了典型远距离卡车司机的做法,也就是说,是的,你不断地寻找从A地到B地的货物,并且总是试图找到回程货。当你去某个地方时,你试图找回程的货物。有不同的市场可以
获得那些货物,但那些通常报酬不太好,所以你可能在去程赚的钱更多,而试图在回程就收回成本。这对远距离卡车司机来说是典型的,但如我所说,也有很多卡车每天只跑同一条路线,或者有一个每周看起来都一样的每周时间表。这是一份艰苦的工作。很多时候不能睡在家里
,处于各种各样的情况中。这是一种艰苦的生活,我非常尊重他们所做的服务。我们拥有的一切在某个时刻都在卡车上,我们需要帮助他们实现脱碳并使用电力,但这不是理所当然的,我们需要表示感谢。谈谈幕后的卡车司机生活,所以每个看过视频的人,还有谁没有推荐
看Electrohocker视频?你了解托比的幕后故事是什么?他很棒。他非常诚实。他有什么说什么,所以幕后不会差太多。但这确实是一种艰苦的生活,他把它做得看起来很容易,我认为这是我们需要记住的,我们
需要用正确的工具支持我们的卡车司机让这一切成为现实,因为并非每个人都来自充电行业并拥有所有这些知识。我们刚刚谈到了充电功率以及如何使用所有支付设备和进行所有设置。这是很难的东西,这也是我们的角色:教育卡车司机如何驾驶电动卡车。但卡车司机会
也只是用信用卡来支付来方便吗?对于卡车来说,通常,卡车司机到目前为止没有真正获得公司信用卡。这不会是一个很大的问题,在其他市场,例如美国,发行信用卡是很正常的。你甚至可以有一种叫做商户类别代码受限信用卡的东西,这意味着你只能使用这张信用卡
用于特定服务,例如,仅用于充电,或仅用于充电和洗车。对于乘用车,我对这种卡变得更普遍抱有一些希望。但现在,我认为我们都同意这个系统有点破碎。你用信用卡每千瓦时支付的价格更多是向生态系统中的其他参与者发出的价格信号:嘿,这是我的初始报价,来找我,让我们协商一个更好的价格。如果你用信用卡支付,你某种程度上是输家,没有真正获得你应得的价格。我认为这是一个悲剧,这真的很遗憾。我希望看到更多的动态定价。我喜欢高峰期和非高峰期定价。我们的基础设施非常宝贵。很快我们会有比基础设施更多的汽车和卡车
在道路上,我们需要平衡事情。我们能做到这一点的最好方式,也是最公平的方式,是在我们需求高时提高价格,在非高峰时段降低价格,分散负载。我们真的没有这样的系统,这并不好,因为我认为充电点运营商愿意朝这个方向发展,但按照我们目前的设置方式,由于中间有移动服务提供商,他们不能真正很好地将这些动态价格转发给最终客户。所以我们处于一种类似纳什均衡或囚徒困境的系统中,每个人都按照自己的最佳利益行动,但我们不在系统最优状态。我们需要某种对系统的冲击或规则的改变,尽管我不是监管的忠实粉丝。我认为我们现在已经过度监管了充电生态系统。
但我们需要对系统的冲击来让我们进入一个更好的均衡。朝这个方向发展,对卡车司机来说有现货市场方向和动态价格的方式,甚至可以以更低的价格充电,就在正午时分,那时有很多太阳。我的意思是,问题是你想优化什么。你想优化充电站的拥挤程度,所以当你有大量需求并想避免排队时,还是你想优化能源采购并通过在价格为负时真正降低价格来提供最低价格?从历史上看,我一直更喜欢使用高峰期和非高峰期定价来管理拥挤,但我越来越喜欢动态定价了,因为它更容易预测,你确切地知道,好的,下周,在
某个时间的价格会是多少,但它仍然是时间可变的,仍然可以分散需求。但越来越多,我开始认同让日前价格或现货市场价格直接发送给车辆的想法。如果你让它透明,这似乎是一个好主意。当卡车司机在夜间有这些长时间时,你甚至看到双向充电吗?那是,它是什么,9小时还是10小时?是的,那么
在道路上,我们需要平衡事情。我们能做到这一点的最好方式,也是最公平的方式,是在我们需求高时提高价格,在非高峰时段降低价格,分散负载。我们真的没有这样的系统,这并不好,因为我认为充电点运营商愿意朝这个方向发展,但按照我们目前的设置方式,由于中间有移动服务提供商,他们不能真正很好地将这些动态价格转发给最终客户。所以我们处于一种类似纳什均衡或囚徒困境的系统中,每个人都按照自己的最佳利益行动,但我们不在系统最优状态。我们需要某种对系统的冲击或规则的改变。
但我们需要对系统的冲击来让我们进入一个更好的均衡。朝这个方向发展,对卡车司机来说有现货市场方向和动态价格的方式,甚至可以以更低的价格充电,就在正午时分,那时有很多太阳。我的意思是,问题是你想优化什么。你想优化充电站的拥挤程度,所以当你有大量需求并想避免排队时,还是你想优化能源采购并通过在价格为负时真正降低价格来提供最低价格?从历史上看,我一直更喜欢使用高峰期和非高峰期定价来管理拥挤,但我越来越喜欢动态定价了,因为它更容易预测,你确切地知道,好的,下周,在某个时间的价格会是多少,但它仍然是时间可变的,仍然可以分散需求。但越来越多,我开始认同让日前价格或现货市场价格直接发送给车辆的想法。如果你让它透明,这似乎是一个好主意。
当卡车司机在夜间有这些长时间时,你甚至看到双向充电吗?那是,它是什么,9小时还是10小时?是的,那么
我们拥有的是灵活性。问题是我们如何使用这种灵活性?我们是否使用这种灵活性,车停在那里9小时,来降低充电功率到也许100千瓦,只充电5、6、7小时?还是说,好吧,让我们实际上安装一个快速充电器,在那里放置一个300千瓦的充电器,并延迟充电直到晚上电价真正便宜,然后你充满电。然后你可以
再进一步,说好吧,让我们安装一个也许功率略高一点的充电器。在那一小时内电价真的很便宜的时候,我们就充满能量,然后在夜间晚些时候当电价可能更贵的时候再放电。但这样的话我们需要在出发前真的很快地给它充电。所以那时你对基础设施的需求就更高了。不幸的是,我看到的是
在大多数这些汽车或卡车停着的夜间,能源市场并不是一天中最有利的时段。所以我有点担心充电损耗在某种程度上不能完全弥补。如果卡车在白天停了一整天,这可能是我们会看到的一个趋势,也许在某个时刻一家物流公司会说,嘿,让我们改变这个,让我们在晚上开车,
因为比如在布伦纳山口,电动卡车现在被允许在晚上行驶。这可能会改变一切,我们会说,好吧,实际上在白天我们可以从太阳能中非常便宜地充电。当然对卡车司机来说不太好,因为那时他们需要在晚上开车。但如果经济上有意义的话,是的,这可能,也想到晚上更长的时间段,但然后在周末,或者想想
自动驾驶车辆之类的东西,这最终可能也会影响你的商业模式。所以谈论这个,快到播客尾声了,你在电动卡车领域,在宏观趋势方面特别兴奋的趋势是什么,它们会如何影响你的业务?所以现在我主要担心的是人工智能以及它将如何影响我们所有人的工作。对于卡车运输
特别是,自动驾驶已经经历了几个炒作周期。在某个时刻应该是可能的。但问题是充电实际上是如何工作的?这在蔚来有点有趣,我们已经有一个完全自动化的系统,所以电池更换是可以做到无需任何人员在内的,车可以自我补充。当
我们有自动驾驶汽车或卡车时,我们还需要思考自动和自动充电解决方案。我看到很多充电机器人的失败项目,它们从侧面插入,感应充电对卡车根本不会相关。当然,感应充电的充电损耗甚至更高。你基本上需要在车辆内有类似于板载充电器的东西,
因为交流波需要转换为电池的直流电。所以无论你想要多少感应功率,你都需要在车里有一个相当大的交流转直流转换器。所以我不认为那会发生。但你也可以有一个底盘装置,可以接触车辆并通过它提供电力。但那当然也是在
车辆的下侧,这非常敏感,我不知道这样的系统必须有多坚固。对于卡车,我还没有真正找到比电池更换更好的自动补充系统。我认为卡车电池更换可能会蓬勃发展,在中国,这是一个改变游戏规则的东西,在那里完美地工作。宁德时代现在在押注它。宁德时代有一个系统。我们去了一家叫e-Haul的公司,它在德国柏林附近有一个很好的
卡车电池更换系统的演示。你只需从侧面进去。它甚至比乘用车简单得多。一个蔚来Power Swap Station是一项技术奇迹,超级复杂。对于卡车,你可以让它简单得多,也因为你不需要担心乘坐舒适性。蔚来Power Swap Station做得超级平稳,所以当你在车辆内时你不会感到害怕或任何东西。但对于卡车
你不需要所有这些,你可以让它超级简单,超级快。所以如果自动驾驶卡车来了,我打赌卡车电池更换也会很快出现。好吧,还有最后的信息或人们可以联系你的方式吗?是的,请下载eTrucker应用,自己检查一下。我们很希望得到一些关于你可能之前访问过的某些站点的反馈。
如果你为充电点运营商工作,想了解更多关于如何使你的站点更适合卡车的信息,我们很乐意帮助站点设计,因为我们看到过各种各样的布局,有些比其他的更好。充电端口位置在那里也是一个大话题。是的,祝你开心,让我们让重型卡车运输
电动化。非常感谢,祝你好运。谢谢。这是与来自Electric Trucker的Michael Clarke的一集。令人印象深刻的背景,多文化,特别是在这么多有趣的公司工作并担任如此多样化的角色,从特斯拉开始,他必须说服酒店老板安装充电器,还有在保时捷工作,真正与路线规划相关的有趣方面,以及如何集成到车辆中和不同的电压、Taycan中的高压等级,这是第一个电动汽车时代最令人印象深刻的电动汽车,然后
当然还有蔚来关于生态系统中的充电,关于更换体验、价格,特别是家中电动汽车驾驶员的动态费率,作为市场上最早的smart charging应用之一。我也喜欢他比较不同的创新步伐,特别是中国的创新步伐,以及我们可以从那里学到什么,只是创新的步伐,也许有时你只是免费推出一个功能。至少这些功能已经存在了,最后,
当然,与Electric Trucker的采访中最重要的部分。尽管市场仍处于初期阶段,但它可能会按照他预期的速度增长,在我看来也是如此,考虑到远程卡车和一般的物流公司确实关心总体拥有成本,这些卡车的价格已经大幅下跌,运营成本与柴油车相比非常非常低。限制措施也越来越多,确实,可行性,这是使用这些车辆的主要
反对意见,已经由Toby展示过了,他的视频对我们这些喜欢这些话题的极客来说超级有趣;我建议大家观看。今天,不仅在某些特定国家,而且在整个欧洲,驾驶这些电动卡车都是可能的。我发现他与我们一起探讨的充电功率水平的细节和技术特性非常引人入胜,同时也包括充电点运营商和充电器如何相互区别,特别是价格上的差异,以及整个行业的发展方向,当然还有Electric Trucker应用程序已有的和即将有的所有功能。特别有趣,我希望你像我一样享受了这次采访。如果你喜欢,请与你认为会对此感兴趣的网络中的人分享,让我们通过分享和评论来参与这场向电动卡车过渡的转变。很快见。
当然,与Electric Trucker的采访中最重要的部分。尽管市场仍处于初期阶段,但它可能会按照他预期的速度增长,在我看来也是如此,考虑到远程卡车和一般的物流公司确实关心总体拥有成本,这些卡车的价格已经大幅下跌,运营成本与柴油车相比非常非常低。限制措施也越来越多,确实,可行性,这是使用这些车辆的主要
Welcome to the Smart Charge by RiDERgy podcast. This is Claudio Geyken, founder and CEO of RiDERgy. This is your show to learn about all things energy management and smart charging innovation for electric vehicles and fleets.
Welcome back to Smart Charge. Today we're getting practical about heavy-duty electrification with Michael Clarke, who co-created the eTrucker from Electro Trucker. A driver-built app that helps e-trucker drivers find truck-suitable charging across Europe, with filters for truck bases, overnight parking, and realistic truck-specific routing. Before that, he worked at companies that are super interesting, like Tesla, Porsche, and NIO, where we also dive deep into and learn about the differences and the interesting projects he worked on - for example, the smart charging NIO app. The
team behind eTrucker didn't build this from a desk. Co-founder Tobias Wagner logged 100,000 electric truck kilometers in a single year to shape the tool. At launch, the database covered 575 truck-ready charging parks, and community contributions quickly added 100 more - a driver-verified data set the team describes as Europe's largest for truck-capable sites. eTrucker went live in 2024 with a three-person team, and the app is now available on Android with a few thousand installs. And on iOS today. Michael and I dig into how driver feedback
improves data quality, what truck-suitable really means on the ground, and what's next for bookings, live data, and e-truck innovation. Buckle up, let's roll. All right, Michael, nice that you're here today. How are you? Thank you. I'm wonderful today. You came from Munich all the way to Berlin to have some business meetings, right? And of course to record this. Yeah, looking forward to it. So before we start and talk about all the things around the Electro Trucker app, which is your current focus,
let's understand a bit who the person Michael is. What's your background? Thank you. Yeah, so I grew up mainly in Germany - before that a little bit in America - but went to university in Munich, studied political science, finished that, and then decided I want to understand more of the world, so I started physics and studied a bachelor's in physics. That was a lot of fun, very stressful time, and I enjoyed that. And then I
had a great opportunity to do an internship with Tesla in Munich at the supercharger team, and had a wonderful year there. Learned so much back in 2016 about e-mobility, and Tesla was on a roll back then. Really grateful for that experience. And then I got an opportunity at Porsche in Stuttgart to launch their global destination charging program - AC chargers mainly at hotels and other luxury locations. Running that for three years was also
an awesome opportunity. And then I got into vehicle product management at Porsche for all the electric vehicles and hybrids, and also future vehicles - specifying the charging performance, where the charge port is, the route planning, all that fun stuff. Really thankful for that. And after that I wanted to come back to Munich and found an opportunity with NIO, where I also did product management but more on the ecosystem side - wall box chargers, a high-
powered charger - we'll maybe get into that stuff later. That was a great three years of my life, and now I'm off to new adventures with eTrucker. So - and how much would you say are you American, and to what extent? You have a certain definition for yourself? I feel German, even though I'm not German - I'm Austrian and American and Irish. But yeah, I feel German,
but my dad's from New York and I enjoy it there as well. Right. And the times at Tesla - you were there in 2016. Can you elaborate on what it was like back then? Before the Model 3, I understand. What were the challenges in those days, if you remember? So, getting the word out. One of my jobs was building the
destination charging network there as well, very similar work. Cold calling hotels, explaining to the front desk what Tesla is - we make electric cars - and usually they were somewhere in the Alps and hadn't heard about electric cars or Tesla at all. So explaining the story, convincing people of electric mobility and that it's the future. It kind of also convinced myself, and I got good
at pitching that. We really grew the destination charging network, and I also helped out with the supercharger network a little bit. Just the amount of professionalism and optimization, really cutting costs - that was really impressive. I think it's awesome what the Tesla supercharger team has done over the last few years - truly an unmatched network. Great to have had a front-row seat to that. Did you meet Elon Musk
or Philip Schroeder?
No, some of the European leadership, but of course that ethos was there and Elon was sort of in the back of everybody's mind. The spirit there was really infectious, and it was just great being part of that team. I'm still friends with many of them, and it's a great community. And what's the latest on the supercharger network? There was this period - I think it was last year - where Elon, I think, wanted to shut it
down somehow. Is there, do you know what's the status there or what happened exactly afterwards? So the way I understood it is that I guess Elon wanted to make an example of somebody, and it unfortunately was the Supercharger team. In the end, I think actually it was a bigger story than maybe what actually happened, especially in Europe. I guess there was downsizing, but not to the extent that you heard about in America. But it's an interesting
question, the role of an OEM in the charging industry. That's, I think, one of the core questions that every carmaker is battling with. Many have sort of followed the same game plan, many have come to similar conclusions, and are now maybe changing their approach. So that's always an interesting question. What are you thinking about when you say changing their approach? So there was Ionity and that sort of coming together, building out infrastructure, getting the basics right.
Then there's always the question of, OK, do you have your own MSP, or mobility service provider, or the charge card essentially. What's the role of that, or do you share those resources? And then we see in the premium segment more of these premium charging lounges popping up, more and more from Porsche and Daimler. I don't think everybody's sure exactly what the long-term role will be, but definitely a lot has
happened, and it was a great time to experience and learn. And then talking Porsche - in those days you said you worked on route optimization, destination charging. What was that about? Yeah, so I was a product manager for charging. On the vehicle side, the Taycan was a very special car, of course. First car with 800 volts, first car with Plug & Charge. The first car really was - in the beginning not so much, but later on then
a very good turbocharging planner, is what we called it. Getting that right, sort of understanding what the users' needs are, what they want to see, what is a good route - the definition of that is sort of very difficult to grasp or to define in software. Some of those learnings now also translate over to what I'm currently doing, so I really enjoyed that. But also back then we had to imagine what the future is like,
what charging speeds would be coming. The Taycan launch was 270 kW peak power, and we couldn't imagine 300 or 400 kW. And now some of the Chinese cars are just coming with 500 or more kW. So imagining the future was really challenging and fun. But also looking into payments - what role does Plug & Charge play - those kind of questions were a lot of fun. And lastly the
whole topic of fast-charging performance. So not just hitting that peak speed, but sort of preconditioning the battery, making sure all the things are optimized so that you can really charge quickly. Because everybody says it depends on so many factors - that's partly true. In the end, it's only battery temperature and SOC that's really going to determine how fast it charges at the appropriate charger. Yeah, we'll come back to that. And then, before today, so to say - NIO -
you said ecosystem, so can you elaborate? It was especially working around charging aspects, I understand. What type of challenges or topics were you mostly looking at? Sure, so on the one hand, just starting from a very simple AC home charger - getting that ready, and NIO makes all their own chargers. In Wuhan, actually, there's a factory that makes the chargers, and getting those certified and ready for the European market, having the
appropriate app and the functions there. I also decided early on to take the whole topic of smart charging sort of out of the wallbox and more into the car itself. We developed a NIO smart charging vehicle function. NIO is also one of the biggest charge point operators in the world, and in Europe we also had about 100 DC fast chargers up in the Nordics. Operating those, getting the
hardware right, integrating a credit card terminal - that was a lot of fun. And also on the battery swapping station, we're also charging batteries there, and the topic of calibration law, for example, is relevant. So you had to have a look at all these aspects that you're just referring to. Sure, and especially having the role of - NIO has a battery swap technology, meaning that the cars can swap their
batteries out quickly. How does that change what the needs of the vehicle are - that was quite fun. And when you say you preferred to look at the vehicle for smart charging instead of the AC charger, what was your reasoning or the rationale behind it? So the rationale behind NIO smart charging is that I saw a way for the vehicle to really use dynamic electricity prices to optimize the charging session. With essentially
two clicks, you just activate smart charging in the vehicle, you set a departure time or a charge-by time. The vehicle automatically knows the day-ahead prices, picks the cheapest hours of the day to charge, and that's when charging happens. We just send commands directly to the vehicle. No setup, no login, no tokens that need to be handled for the user. They just need to make sure that their electricity tariff is dynamic, that they have a smart meter, but essentially it doesn't
matter which energy provider they have, because the dynamic electricity prices mainly follow all the same day-ahead signals. So it makes sense. But when you say specifically that you prefer to do it via the vehicle instead of the charger that NIO is building, what did you mean with that? So essentially if we do it via the vehicle, it doesn't really matter what the charger can do. It can be a dumb charger or a non-connected charger from any manufacturer. And doing it through the wall
box has the challenge that the communication with AC charging is actually quite limited. For example, the charger doesn't know what the state of charge of the vehicle is, and therefore doesn't really know how much energy the car wants or needs, which kind of limits what you can do. Now with ISO 15118 and the mandate for that in the future also for AC home charging, that will partly change, but we said, OK, we can quickly implement a function here that has real value to
our users, especially in the Nordics that already have dynamic electricity tariffs and smart meters. And we just went ahead and did it. It didn't cost much to develop or make. The prices are freely available. So it was really simple to do and solved sort of one of the core problems that many carmakers are battling with. Yeah, no, totally right. Interesting, and let's geek out a little bit. I think many people either don't know, or if they know,
they probably don't know why. So indeed the state of charge, which is how much battery you basically still have and how many kilometers you can still drive, is not something that is communicated to the wall box at the AC level, but at the DC level it is. So why is that? Do you know the technical background behind it? And when is ISO 15118 going to be implemented in all the AC chargers, if somebody doesn't
have a NIO but wants to see their state of charge through their wall box - when can they expect to see it? Yeah. So AC charging today works quite simply using pulse width modulation, or PWM signal, and there is essentially only the state and the charging current that can be communicated from the wall box to the vehicle. So the vehicle, as a charger, for example, says, OK, you can charge with 10 amps, for example.
And actually the number of phases that you charge on isn't defined either. The vehicle will just take however many phases, 1 or 3, as it gets. So actually, even the charging power doesn't get explicitly communicated during AC charging, because the only point of doing this is to protect the wires - either the wire from the charger to the vehicle or, in the house, the cable from the distribution box to the charger. And that's what you're trying to protect. So you set a maximum
charging current, and that is communicated to the vehicle. But the vehicle is actually the one in charge, pulling the energy through the onboard charger. So the charger can't actually directly change how much power goes through it. It's just sort of monitoring what's going on, and in case the vehicle is pulling too much power, it can shut down the charging session, but there is not much more going on. Wall boxes are essentially just an adapter to the vehicle with some safety functions built
in. So that's how it currently works. The EU, with a delegated act that was recently announced, said that from 2027 onwards AC wall boxes at home need to support ISO 15118-20, which means that you now have sort of a high-level communication going on, so you can send data packets back and forth. You need an additional small modem in the charger, which makes it also a little bit more expensive, and of course
then you need to implement this software stack. At NIO we experienced that for us it was really easy to implement the AC charging protocol - we did it ourselves. Now with 15118, it's not something that an AC charger manufacturer can realistically do in-house. You need to rely on some of the software providers in the ecosystem to give that to you, or you need to buy it from them. So both on the hardware side and on the software side
it does make AC charging quite a bit more expensive. So I'm not a huge fan of this 15118 mandate for basic AC charging, especially considering that if you actually control the vehicle, you can do really cool smart charging features there as well. I guess the hope is that essentially all home chargers become bidirectional in the future and all vehicles would be bidirectional, and it solves all our energy problems. But that is an assumption, and not
a fact, and it's quite interesting that they decided to mandate that. Just on the last point that you made - you say that you need the AC charger to be that smart by implementing ISO 15118 just to make the bidirectional case, right? That you can only do via the vehicle. So bidirectional charging - of course you need a way for the vehicle and charger to communicate with each other. So the charger, for example, needs to say, hey,
now I want you to discharge this amount of power. And that's a message that in the old communication protocol just didn't exist. So you need this high-level communication. And that's actually sort of the main issue about bidirectional charging - nothing actually changes in the wall box. It's just a wire going through it. So yeah, the magic happens in all the communication. You also want safety, because if the power goes out and you have people working on
the power grid, you don't want vehicles to suddenly start discharging power into a grid where people are touching the wires. So a lot of safety standards and grid codes go into that. Yeah, so just to be clear: if I have an AC charger right now at home with a vehicle that is bidirectional, that could be discharging - there's vehicle-to-load. I think there are plenty of vehicles out there that with AC can discharge, but only to
an appliance. If you want to discharge to your home or if you want to discharge to the grid, the big hurdle is having this protection on the charger - at the charger level - that protects, so to say, the grid from flows that shouldn't be flowing if there is a blackout, as you say, and some people are working on the grid. That's one big thing. But then the software stack for bidirectional charging could actually be only in
the vehicle, or am I wrong in that? You could run the V2G or the V2Home algorithms and software only in the vehicle - you don't really need to upgrade the wall box, would you? I guess the way ISO 15118 is currently set up is that the idea is that the charger is sort of centric to this smart charging approach, and that the charger, from whatever
source - maybe a home energy manager or maybe from a grid operator - gets a signal to please discharge energy into the grid. And when you do that, of course, the vehicle needs to exactly match the frequency of the grid. Concerning the grid codes, you need to have defined behavior: what happens if that grid frequency - which is 50 Hz in Europe - what happens if that deviates by, you know, 0.3 Hz for how many seconds? What are you supposed to do? Are
you supposed to lower the power? Are you supposed to completely shut off? Because that can trigger - if multiple devices in the grid behave incorrectly - it can make blackouts worse. And these grid codes, are they only at the transmission grid level or also at the distribution grid level? Mainly the TSO is in charge of maintaining the grid frequency across its grid, so mainly they are responsible for buying and implementing grid services. So in
that case, yes, they would be in charge there. But also, I guess they delegate some of the responsibilities to the distribution system operator, and the distribution system operator has additional requirements, of course, because they don't worry about the frequency, but they worry about transformers being overloaded and similar things. And touching back on the smart charging that you did - did you also consider self-consumption of solar energy, or was it
purely focused on the day-ahead spot market optimization? Yes, the day-ahead optimization is the first step. Of course you can also do solar-optimized charging, and you can do solar-optimized charging essentially in two ways. You can have your house measure your PV production and the house grid consumption and how much power you're exporting into the grid, and you can start charging to consume that. But I also looked into an alternative, because this
of course requires a lot of integrations and a lot of knowledge sharing. I also looked at - as part of my master's thesis - whether you can actually get similarly good results by just looking at professional solar intensity forecasts. Big operators of solar panels buy very accurate solar forecasts, including cloud movements and wind, because their job is to bid on the day-ahead market
and say, hey, I'm going to provide this much power at a certain time in the future. So they need very good forecasts, and we can use those at home to also make a pretty good estimation of how much power the solar system will be producing. You can make certain assumptions about what your own house grid consumption will be, and then you get like the 80 or 90% solution, which is much better than nothing. And
actually for most people probably good enough - and the question is how much additional cost and work do you want to put into those last 10% of optimization. So was that implemented? As a new driver, can they activate that feature? The plans are ready for doing solar-optimized charging, but I didn't get around to implementing it. OK, very nice indeed that you did the dynamic spot price feature, because that's something also quite unique. I'm not
sure - I'm not familiar with all the OEMs out there - but it sounds quite unique. I think what enabled us to do it is we took ourselves out of the equation. We didn't try to get value out of this, we didn't try to earn money through this function, and sort of that clouds your vision if your primary focus is to try to earn money with each function. We just flipped it around and said, OK, what can we do for the
user to fix his problem? And we found a solution that's really cheap to implement, works really reliably, and just does it. But of course it doesn't earn any money with it - it solves a problem. And is it being used a lot? Yeah, we're super happy that in the Nordics everybody has it. Of course, the price variations aren't as big as we experience here in Germany, but still they save a lot of money using it, and it's
As I said, super easy to set up. Anybody can do it. And it memorizes the location where you are, and every AC charging session inside of this bubble will then be smart-charging optimized, and everything outside, of course, will not. So yeah, it's really easy to manage. Can you also quantify how much they saved the driver? We calculated sort of what the earning potential was, and we figured out that you can probably save around 30% of your electricity costs, but as I
said, it's in the Nordics - the variation in pricing, because they have relatively consistent power generation, isn't that big as the potential is in Germany, but here we don't have the smart meters, so that's the problem. The goddamn smart meters in Germany. But let's not touch upon that topic, and there's plenty of other and more interesting things to touch upon. And battery swapping - I find that as well fascinating. I think NIO is probably the number one company out
there doing this. And can you share a bit more about the usage? You said interestingly there's the AC wall boxes, there's also the HPC cables that NIO has - fixed DC. Yeah, we have a 500 kW DC fast charger, which really is one of the fastest chargers in Europe, and yeah, they work great. And so are the users using these swappable batteries more than the fixed HPC, for example? And what do you also make of NIO being
the only one really pushing that concept further and not other OEMs, for example? So NIO usually has battery swapping and high-powered charging at the same location, and the user usually has a choice which one to use. And indeed, if both are available, they usually choose to swap, just because it's that much faster. It's fun, and it works very well. So battery swapping really is a great technology. It's a niche. I
don't expect every manufacturer or everybody to need it. There's a certain user group - for example, taxis - they really love it. For them it just solves a lot of issues, and for them it's the right thing to do. I don't think every car in Europe needs to have it. But I also have been to China a few times, and there, of course, battery swapping is just a way of life. I know people there that
haven't charged their car at all. They just swap, and there are so many swap stations there. Yeah, if you really have a good network, it just works. And what do you make of other OEMs not following suit? I completely understand. It does limit yourself a little bit in sort of what kind of cars you can make, the sizes of the vehicle, and it does add a little bit of cost, but it doesn't prevent
you from fast charging. So NIO vehicles can charge with 240 kW, even on a 400 V system. So you definitely don't have to make compromises on the fast-charging side as well. But for me, what made battery swapping so interesting is that after a battery swap, you have an empty battery. And the question is, what do you do with that empty battery? Do you charge it immediately, or do you essentially use the same algorithm that we use for the
cars - you do smart charging. So you wait for the electricity price to go down, and then you charge your vehicle. So you can kind of offer a fast-charging experience but at sort of AC electricity prices. And that's really neat - you can just use the energy when it's good for the grid, when it's cheap. So what's the price actually if I go as a NIO driver and want to swap my battery here in Germany, for example?
Yeah, it depends also a bit on location and country, but I think we're under 45 cents in some areas. It's quite a competitive price. And talking - you've worked at an American company, a market leader in EVs in the western world, and then you worked at Porsche, which is definitely known for high performance and has built the Taycan as an awesome EV, and then yeah, NIO that we just discussed as well, standing for an innovative Chinese
player. There are more around, given Xiaomi, given BYD and so on. So what's your take on the future of the OEM leadership board, so to say, and especially the EV world? Yeah, so those have been very different experiences. Tesla was sort of special. I think it was lightning in a bottle. I don't think it's easily recreated. I also don't think other American OEMs are similar. I guess the European model -
there are certain similarities between the German OEMs and the way they think, the way it works internally. You have a lot of assurance - you know sort of what the baseline is, you know what the decisions are, you can count on that to a certain extent. With a Chinese car company, the decisions are quicker, and they can change from day to day, and that enables an awesome innovation pace - something that is
also expensive to keep up, but each iteration makes the product better or cheaper, and that's really, really hard to compete with. I don't expect all the Chinese OEMs to be the same. I think there are probably big differences between startups and newcomers and the more established players, but in general, having a country focused on e-mobility really unlocks a lot of potential, and the cars are really good. Yeah. So let's now switch gears and talk
About the next phase, where you're currently in. What drove you as well to change now from Neo - and I think what is it, 2 months - and start the Electric Trucker app or company? What's the official name of the company? It's Electra Trucker Media, but the app is called eTrucker. And what sort of fascinated me is that charging at some point is going to become normal. It's something actually I
realized at Porsche: we had a charging product manager, but we didn't have a refueling product manager. Gas stations are kind of - there's no need to have expertise there. And I don't know if charging will go down that road. It definitely seems complicated enough that there'll still be interesting things to do, and I don't think on the car side we've solved all the issues yet. But I saw an
opportunity to go into the heavy-duty trucking area, also with the intention of maybe not recreating similar mistakes we made with passenger vehicles - using those lessons learned to really get it right the first time. That's why I teamed up with Tobias Wagner, who's the Electric Trucker, and I was fortunate enough to create the eTrucker app with him, and Mathias Brands, who's our software engineer. Together we
decided what we wanted to do. We mainly made this in the first step to help Tobias in his day-to-day work. He's still a truck driver - two weeks ago he went from Turkey to Portugal in essentially one go. The eTrucker app really helps his day-to-day work. The app tells you when you will arrive at a certain station and whether it is inside or outside your
remaining driving time. You can filter for specific CPOs, and he can also see which locations are actually suitable for overnight charging, because many of the infrastructure and high-power chargers built for trucks are actually built for that 45-minute break period during the day, where you're expected to leave after you charge. But truckers also have to do a 9- or 11-hour break later in the evening. And that's, I think,
the more interesting charging sessions, because that's actually where you charge more energy than during the short break. So one step back - what was the background story on how it all started? Did you meet Tobias at an event? Yeah, we met at an E.ON Drive Summit, a little bit over a year ago. We hit it off - I asked some of the right questions,
I was interested in understanding how it works. I had some experience with navigation systems and apps and the mobility service provider side of things. We said, OK, let's do this as a side project, see where it goes, and started to rate and evaluate high-powered charging sites on their suitability for trucks, brought that together, came up with an app, and just launched it.
And the company that's built - you are the three founders you just mentioned. So Tobias is still in his trucker role and obviously helps out with very practical experience, and Mathias was the other co-founder. You are now all in and trying to bootstrap a bit, living off your savings to make it work, right? We don't have many expenses right now. Of course we do
want to provide a premium experience. That's why we use very good maps - we use Google Maps, for example, because they have very high quality satellite imagery, which we find important for the truck driver to visually confirm that yes, there is enough space there to charge or park after the charging session, compared to other map providers like OpenStreetMap. And if you don't have that satellite view, you're missing out on a lot of context that helps
increase the confidence that you'll have a successful charging session there. We also use TomTom for very good truck-specific routes, so we can tell you exactly when you'll arrive with a truck. You're only allowed to drive 80 or 90 kilometers per hour in certain countries, and we take that into consideration, as well as the route you have to take, to make the best recommendation and visualization
possible. So that costs a little bit, but it's worth it to us. And just to understand the problem in detail: if I'm a trucker right now and I want to drive an electric truck, what's the key problem I'm facing that you're trying to address? The top 3, if you want to elaborate. Trucking has gone down the road where we now have quite good electric trucks already, even though for some of these companies
it's the 1st or 2nd iteration of their heavy-duty truck. They're actually quite capable, and we see often that they're used on relatively boring routes - point to point, every day the same route. That's also challenging, and you need charging solutions for that. You need to either build depot chargers at the origin or destination, or you have to find a charging site in between where you go every day. It's very repeatable, very predictable. There, our app would
Maybe help you determine if the charger you usually use is occupied or not. But what I think is more interesting, and where Tobias is sort of trailblazing, is this whole long-haul trucking area, which many people didn't think is ready for electric trucks yet. But we actually believe that that's where they can best show their advantages, have lower operating costs, and to get the payback period on a slightly more
expensive electric truck, you need to drive a lot of kilometers, and the trucks that drive the most kilometers are long-haul trucks. So we want to sort of open up that space, make it possible, give truckers the right tools to succeed, and we believe the eTrucker app is sort of the tool they need to never have worries and always find the right charger for their situation. So just to be again very specific, and sorry if I'm trying
to really nail this, but if I'm a trucker and you're trying to pitch me your solution, so to say, what's my problem, why would I need you, so to say, if I have my truck from MAN or any other OEM.
So we found actually that even for diesel trucks, many truckers don't really use the onboard navigation system of the truck. They have either tablets or phones with other navigation solutions, often also coming from the logistics company themselves, or tablets built into the vehicle. So the onboard navigation system of most of these trucks doesn't have very good POI data on where the truck can charge. And that's the main pain point we're solving, by
giving him or her very clear instructions on where they can go to charge. And it's really easy to operate - there's just one layer, really big buttons, and a very good overview of where you are. So the way you answer my question, so to say, is: if I need to deliver something from A to B, you answer where should I charge. And that's sort of also one of the things we noticed, is that there are
big differences in how autonomous, or how much responsibility, the driver has. We see some logistics companies that define everything for the trucker - exactly where they need to be, where they're going to charge, what route they're going to take. And maybe they optimize that and they have a good reason to recommend that. On the other hand, we see some logistics companies that roughly give the time that you need to be somewhere, but how you get
there is kind of up to you. And what we see, and what's great to have us on board, is to show how unpredictable the day is. You know, if you run into a traffic jam or you need to reroute, all the best plans just break down, and having a good and robust eTrucker app to help you out in these situations, we believe, brings a lot of value and
just unlocks long-haul trucking for most logistics companies. And so one of the big issues you said, when you want to help me understand where to charge, is to understand which sites are truck-friendly, so to say, right? So that's the kind of answer you're giving me - what are the best sites for me, which ones are truck-friendly. Yeah, so we define truck-friendly to have at least enough space on site to park your trailer, decouple,
and then go to the charging station to charge. That's sort of the bare minimum. If you don't have a place to park your trailer on site, we don't usually consider that. And also, of course, on the way to the charger, you can't go through a road where it's prohibited for trucks. And often there is either a weight limit or a height limit that prevents you from using specific chargers.
So we take all of that into consideration. We are also actually very conservative about what we include. We don't want to include any sites where there's potential for pedestrians or children, or just a lot of traffic. We don't believe those sites to be truck-friendly and don't want to route any trucks there. But we found that actually quite a number of sites are truck-friendly. We also, of course, include all the sites
where you don't have to decouple - sort of the pull-through locations. And even if you activate the only pull-through location filter, you can still pretty much get from A to B across Europe. Of course, the challenge for optimizing this is you want to find a charger that is as close as possible to the end of your driving time shift. So when you start driving, you can drive for 4.5 hours. You kind of want to find a charger that's between
4 hours 10 minutes and 4 hours 30 minutes - nothing over, but also nothing considerably less, because then you're sort of losing time. So really having those options helps truck drivers achieve the same performance as diesel trucks. So the key dimensions are, on the one hand, understanding which sites are truck-friendly, and the second is which sites are truck-friendly along my route and able to fit within the driving constraints - those 4.5 hours that you
need to then take a break with, and then daily limits and weekly limits, right? Yeah, so that's the most important thing. We also have the long-pause filter, where you can say, OK, this is a location where you can actually stay the night, stay 9 or 11 hours, charge up there, and not worry about things. So these are the things we believe are most important. This is sort of the data model we built around
It actually doesn't perfectly fit into this OCPI data model, where you sort of describe charging locations, which is sort of the agreed-upon standard to communicate charging locations that MSPs use to communicate with charge point operators. So, yeah. Alright, I think that makes sense, and the solution you provide - we touched upon already a bit - so it's a navigation tool, a map, so TomTom and Google Maps, and then we have also this charge
point data. Then I think I read an article about EcoMovement, right, so you get that and then you combine it all together, and then as a driver I can easily say I need to go from A to B. And you tell me where I need to charge best, and I can also set some more filters myself, right? Yeah, so currently we're not really telling you, OK, this specific charger is the one you have to go to. We're more about showing you
all the options along your route, so you can make the best decision. You know, truck drivers for us are professionals. They're experts at what they do. And we believe that giving them just the right tools to succeed is the best way going forward. And for us, it's great that we can also rely on a community. We really take this POI data topic very seriously. We have a great partner in EcoMovement, who just gives us a
great base layer of where the chargers are. They give us live occupancy data, and on top of that we put our attributes. Actually, the trucker community is helping build that. So on each charger, if you open it up, you can sort of report an error, but you can also sort of upgrade a charger, because we know where every DC charger is. You just click on it and say, hey, actually, I think this is a DC
charger for trucks. And then we take a look at it, and if Tobias and I agree that it's truck-compatible, we add it to the main map. And we also point out a lot of locations where we believe truck charging might be possible, and then we have a community feedback mode that you can go into and say, hey, actually, I've been to the charger and no, it's not truck-compatible. Let me let them know that, and then we take
it out or we add it as a truck charger. Interesting, and I also read something about a chip - what you call it - the e-trucker chip. Yeah, yeah, can you elaborate on that one? So the way payment for trucking currently works - it's quite an interesting space and we'd love to sort of play a part in enabling this - is that often a logistics company will make a deal with a specific charge point operator in exchange for a certain volume commitment in
kilowatt hours. And logistics companies, if they have a few trucks, are actually talking about millions of kilowatt hours that they might be charging in public. And so there is some leverage there to negotiate prices. And what that usually means is that from that charge point operator, you get a charge card, you put that into the truck, and the trucker will use that to charge there. But if you do that with two or three different
CPOs, then you start to get two or three RFID cards. Then maybe add a few more for your depot chargers at your own home depot or also at some depot-sharing opportunities. And then we get into a similar situation to where we were with the cards, where you have ten different RFID cards, and each mistake of pulling the wrong card can actually be a really expensive mistake, because you're charging up to 500 kWh, and doing
that at the wrong price makes the whole route potentially unprofitable. Yeah, that's quite a big cost. Yeah, and so what the e-trucker chip allows us is to maybe combine some of these cards together, so you can tell the logistics company that we often charge with, hey, you don't need to give me another card. Here is the token that I already have in the vehicle. Please just add that to your system and let me charge
that. And the same also works for bigger CPOs, where you can tell them, hey, this is the card I'm using, please add it to your system and then send me the bill afterwards. It's just - maybe it's a stupid question - isn't that the MSP model? Currently the e-trucker chip is not an MSP. We're not part of the transaction. We just provide essentially the physical card that can be registered in different systems, but
that's an area we're looking into - what role does an MSP play in trucking. That's a really interesting question that we're battling with right now, because we have these two extremes. On the one hand, logistics companies want the flexibility to pick the right charger exactly at the right spot to optimize their driving time. On the other hand, they're willing to give up a little bit of that flexibility and commit kilowatt hours to certain charge point operators in exchange for a
significantly lower price. And this interesting interplay is something where we're looking into what role an MSP, or payment solutions in general, might play. Makes sense. And your intention is to be - what type of player - how would you call yourself? Is it like a route optimization app, a navigation app? Do you want to eventually be a payment service? And what will be the business model? Yeah, so we look at
this from the driver's perspective and then an extension from the logistics company perspective, what do they need to succeed with electric trucks and whatever they need. And wherever we find an opportunity, that's what we're going to provide. Currently it's the map with manually verified POI data for each individual charger that we believe has a lot of value right now. Even though the app is free, and anybody can just go to the App Store and download
the e-Trucker app, even just as a car driver and say, hey, I want to be part of the e-Trucker community and verify a location. So that part will always be free. But then this interplay between the flexibility you need and the flexibility you're willing to give up as a logistics company to break even or be profitable, that's where we want to help the logistics company in the future. It sounds interesting, and the stakeholders we
we've mentioned a few that you have to engage with. I think in German, Spedition is freight forwarder, I think in English, right? So the driver of course is essential, but do you also need to coordinate with the freight forwarding company or is that not relevant for your app? Yes, so we do see different solutions coming from both sides. So coming from the freight forwarder or the logistics company in general,
really planning centrally the route for the driver and recommending them where to charge. And right now we're coming a little bit from the other side and saying, OK, actually if the driver is responsible himself, and especially you always have problems - even the best plan, and even if you have a backup plan, things go wrong. And that's where the - everybody has a plan until he gets hit in the face. Yeah, absolutely, that's what we see and
that's sort of what Tobias shows us every week in his videos, and yeah, that's just an exciting space to be in. OK, and the idea of - so the freight forwarder has to bring something from A to B, and so there are different logistics companies or the customers of the logistics companies that could set up chargers. Is that a stakeholder
that is relevant for you, or do you purely look at the public chargers, so more the charge point operators and public? No, we do see that there is an opportunity for private depot charging to be a little bit cheaper than public charging. And what we cannot forget ever is that logistics companies really care about what the price of a kilowatt hour is. And if they can save a few cents, that's generally what's going to happen.
So if we can find depots where they can charge cheaper, that's where we'll go. And currently we do include depot chargers in the app. We mark them to say, hey, you actually need to register before you go here and make a contract with the depot. But if you drive past one of these depots every day, it'd be nice to know that there would be a good charging opportunity
there. So we want to be a platform for logistics companies and charge point operators, or these depots with depot chargers, to come together and find the optimal route, because that's really what we're here for. We just want to make electric trucks a reality in Europe. Makes sense. And you built the product quite quickly. I don't know how long it took you to build the app. So Matias is an awesome software developer, and he really
created it quite quickly and at super high quality. It works very well. But also, of course, we're not trying to overcomplicate things. We focus on what's really adding value, we include that and cut out all the rest, so that enables us to be quite nimble right now. And how many users do you have right now and how did they find you? So we have over 8,000 downloads right now, which exceeded my expectations
by a lot. And so, what's really awesome is that most of them are just part of the e-Trucker community, also driving normal trucks. But we also saw great interest from people going with their trailer on vacation, so normal cars but with the Wohnwagen - they need similar chargers. So we have a lot of those on the app as well, and
yeah, just people providing feedback on the different chargers, and that's what we're so thankful for. We get up to 20 feedbacks per day, verifying chargers, showing us new ones, and telling us which ones aren't really truck-capable, so we're super thankful for that. And usually you want to grow by word of mouth, or is Tobias actually with his videos - I imagine also super good to get new
users to find you, or do you also have a strategy on how to get more users? Yeah, so we're now more focused on getting other logistics companies on board. We want fewer users but really high-value users, because with the e-Trucker app we're kind of controlling flows of many thousands of kilowatt hours. So each user or truck driver is valuable to us.
We're super thankful for everybody that uses it, and they also have an opportunity to sort of give back by providing feedback. Yeah, that makes sense. Do you know if new entrants like Juna from Zenda - would that be something interesting, would they be a partner for you, or how do you look at that? We're absolutely open to any kind of partnerships, and we also provide the POI data through our
partner EcoMovement. So you can approach EcoMovement to ask for the eTrucker data, and then you can use it in your own front end or application. That way we're sort of sharing it to anybody who might need it. OK. And just zooming out a little bit on the market of long-haul trucking - can you share some numbers, like how many long-haul trucks are there, how many are electric, and maybe
distinguish them also by geography? Yeah, so that's always an interesting part of the job - that sort of reality check. Of course, if you only watch Tobias's videos and you think electric trucks are here, it works, everything's great, why isn't everybody doing this? But talking to the logistics companies - yeah, that gives you a reality check, to say, OK, there are some considerations and some, maybe imagined, drawbacks of
electric trucks that need to be addressed, and where education needs to happen. Like, for example, what kind of objections do you get to electric trucking? Well, the most common one is that they're not suitable for long-haul trucking, only for point-to-point range. And yeah, that's the main one - charging speed. And there are a lot of players that are also calling for the megawatt charging system, or
the MCS plug, with much higher charging power. And they say, yeah, we need to get those chargers in the ground first before we can even consider electric trucks. We don't believe that to be the case, and I think Tobias shows it every week that it works. And there might be some use cases for MCS megawatt charging, but we really haven't found them yet. So we're just debunking it. Why
do you think it's not needed to get started, if some trucker or freight forwarder is listening to this? Yeah, so, assuming you can charge overnight, a truck starts the day and can drive 4.5 hours at 80 or 90 kilometers per hour. And that gets you to maybe 40% SOC on one of these big trucks - the Mercedes Actros 600 is a great example - where yeah, they
just are not empty after those 4.5 hours. And if you plug into, let's say, 250, 300, maybe even 400 kW of power, you get back up to maybe 70%, and then you're only allowed to drive 4.5 more hours. You just can't empty a battery in a day - it just doesn't really happen. The only thing you need to do is use the eTrucker app, activate the overnight parking filter, and find
a place where you can charge overnight. And then you can do that every day, and there really is no reason why it shouldn't work. So, as I said, 400 kW of power is plenty. And what I would kind of like to see is - in the eTrucker app we also note down whether the cable is cooled or uncooled, and that doesn't really make a big difference for the logistics company, but
liquid-cooled cables are really awesome. They can hold the power for the whole hour that a truck might charge. But of course they also produce a lot of heat waste because the cable - the copper wire - is actually much thinner. Uncooled cables are also quite good because they don't have those losses. Of course, after maybe 10–15 minutes they might go into derating and you need to lower the charging power,
but even those are perfectly fine for a 45-minute charging session in most cases. So coming back to the initial question - how many long-haul trucks are there in Europe, and how many electric ones? Yeah, so right now - I don't know the exact number right now - but we see a little bit over 100 truck drivers in the app that have sort of the usage profile of an electric truck driver. And we see it
growing every day. I think new truck sales are actually quite electric-heavy. We hope that trend continues, and that these trucks will be given the full capability of also being long-haul trucks. I think by 2030, 30% of new truck sales will be electric. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that stat - here in Germany, or
in Europe, was it? I'm blanking a little bit on the exact one, but something like that. And I imagine they're broken down more on the distribution trucks before reaching 30% long-haul, or is it something you're confident will also happen in long-haul? So, currently - maybe I'm living in this bubble - but I'm confident that it will become apparent and clear that electric trucks are cheaper to operate. I think right
But that's numbers maybe for the one that doesn't, is not so familiar - in which way is it cheaper today already. So of course the truck costs a little more, but electricity is just cheaper than diesel, even the highly subsidized diesel. So the electric truck already has a slight edge, and now it all depends on how many kilometers you drive to really exploit that edge.
Tobias has a few videos on breaking down the exact numbers in euros. And we do believe that it's a tipping point. So as soon as you reach this point - and it might be different for each country - if that tipping point is reached, there's no real reason for logistics companies to still be buying new diesel. And the electric trucks get turned over more quickly if they only serve in their capacity for a few years.
A few years, and then it gets turned over. So by 2030, or 2032 or something, we'll have gone through almost one complete overhaul of the whole fleet. So the transition to fully electric could be much quicker than in passenger vehicles, because emotional factors play less of an issue, and our job right now is just to clear all the roadblocks, clear up all the misconceptions, and
let the economy do its thing. Yeah, in the long haul, as you define it or as it's defined, it would be not only one country, right? So you are immediately from day one already using your app internationally. So actually, this week we launched the map also for Spain, Portugal, UK, Belgium, and Romania, in addition to the network we already have, so we essentially cover the whole of Europe right
now. Of course we wanted to do it step by step because, as I said, we manually verify each location, and we don't want to show any locations that haven't been manually verified, so it just took some time to go through each and every one. But yeah, we're really happy that we finally covered Europe completely. And we don't plan to go much beyond that for now. And going back to the objections you hear when you talk to truckers
or freight forwarders - you said range is one topic they bring up, which we already talked about and how it can be solved. Are there other big ones? Yeah, it's essentially the charging network. So range and charging network go a little bit hand in hand, but as I said, you need to find a location at the end of your driving time each day. So yes, you do need quite a tight
network. But you don't need fully dedicated truck sites. We're super happy that they're coming online, and of course if we get more and more electric trucks, we need just bigger sites. I'm much more a fan of having fewer but bigger sites. That's sort of also one of the lessons learned I took away from my time at Tesla - it's smarter to have fewer but bigger sites, and I think they were really pioneers in sort
of understanding queuing theory, which describes the average waiting time depending on how many servers or chargers you have. That's what I'd like to see - these really big central hubs. We don't need that many of them, but yeah. We also need to talk about prices. I want charging to be at some point profitable for the CPO - I think that's fair. We need
to give them at least a chance to become profitable in a reasonable amount of time. Just calling for cheaper charging without considering the cost behind that isn't really going to be a long-term solution. I'm not a huge fan of really price-undercutting, and I am a big fan of optimizing your costs, making sure that you build cheaply and effectively and don't make
mistakes. That's something Tesla did very, very well, and that's why today they can still offer some of the best prices out there. Unfortunately, none of the Tesla Superchargers are truck-compatible. The cable is a little bit too short, and the Supercharger cabinets only go up to 500 volts, whereas essentially all the trucks are 800-volt vehicles. That's sort of preventing that, but there are enough other
chargers that can go up to 1000 volts. I actually don't mind anymore. I think Mercedes now launched the CLA without the 800-volt option - at least that's what they announced, then they changed their mind again because of backlash - but yeah, you can get through Europe on 1000 volts, no problem. Interesting. And in other countries, even if you were to be the most optimistic e-trucker and you would say yeah, that's not possible - that's sort of one
of the biggest eye-opening things. I got through at least virtually, and also sometimes visited them myself - each of these countries - and looked at how they build high-powered chargers. You're right, there are huge differences, but it's actually not the countries that you might maybe expect. Tobias's trip two weeks ago to Turkey was mind-boggling - how good the infrastructure was, how many chargers there were, and how powerful.
They were surprisingly good, and also the Nordics, they have really good networks. But you also see, of course, the countries where space is a scarce resource - Germany, Switzerland - they don't have that much space and it's much more difficult. Spain, of course, is my favorite country right now for trucking. I think they've got a great network, they got so much space. Spain's really, really good.
The UK, surprisingly, not so much. Not that many good chargers, very narrow roads, very little space for the trucks. I'm a little bit worried about the UK right now. Also Netherlands - not that much space, a lot of older hardware, because they started a little bit earlier, and that just means you have a little bit older legacy hardware. Yeah, that makes sense. And talking prices, you
already hinted upon that - that's the key, the total cost of ownership. What's the price difference from CPO to CPO, the range or the average that you have encountered? So we see, you need to either include or exclude value added taxes, but the range of course goes from 39 cents to 80 cents in some cases. And 80 cents just doesn't make sense - yes, sorry, gross, right - and that just, you
know, doesn't really work. It might work for passenger vehicles that just charge maybe 60 kWh, but if you're charging 500 kWh it makes a huge difference. We haven't really found as an industry or ecosystem yet the perfect solution, but I think we have the right people at it, and the motivation right now is really great. We see a lot of interest from the charge point operators in
making their sites more truck-friendly, maybe also making business offers for trucks. So we see that as a very positive development, and we want to help them make their payback times for the charging sites quicker. Yeah, that makes sense. And in terms of kWh in the battery, what size of batteries have you seen? So long-haul trucks go from 500 to 600 kWh of usable battery energy, some even a
little bit more. Of course, that's one of the fun topics - it's actually not that easy to say exactly how much energy is in a battery. It kind of depends on how you discharge it, how quickly, at what temperature, and actually when you stop discharging. That determines how many kWh exactly you can pull out. Yeah, but it doesn't really matter because, you know,
these batteries are so huge and they have awesome range. It's roughly 1 kWh per kilometer, that's what we've been seeing, which makes calculating this stuff really easy. We'll see - maybe in the winter it goes back up a little bit, but that's what we're at. And focusing a bit on depot charging, do most of the truckers that you're currently monitoring - like you can see from Toby and his videos and the
Nano Jansen - they have lots of charging infrastructure at the depots. Is it very commonplace now that electric truckers today can always rely on their own depot at their company where they can charge? Yeah, that's usually one of the places logistics companies start - to ask the question: how can I add chargers to my depot? And they very quickly hit the wall of grid capacity, which is probably going to be an
issue. And then you see some companies that say, OK, let's do this anyway, let's try it with maybe also lower grid capacity. Like, how much is a typical grid capacity at these logistics companies? It really depends on the history of the site. If it has historically been a large industrial area, they might have a lot of excess capacity, but usually not so much, and in many cases you can probably only add maybe 100 or 200
kW of power. And then the question is, what role does battery buffering play? I assume others are probably more of an expert on that, but it's not a 1-to-1 replacement for grid capacity. And it's mostly DC charging, right, even at the depot - not AC? Yeah, we don't see much AC charging for trucks anymore. I guess that's fine. I don't expect that trend to jump over to passenger vehicles,
but for trucks it kind of makes sense. And in terms of chargers, is there a dominant hardware - we see the Alpitronic being everywhere. Is that the preferred brand? Depots are often with Kempower, I think that's a very well-known brand, yeah. What was also really interesting is going through historical videos and pictures of sites. I look at every individual charging site and usually on Google you can see historic
pictures from three or four years ago, and you see all kinds of chargers being used there. But if you then look at the most recent picture, often you do see an Alpitronic HyperCharger there. It almost scares me how much other charging hardware they have replaced - charger hardware that I thought at least was fine - even those got replaced in many cases. I guess that's OK. I also do see a big trend
towards these sort of distributed systems where you have one central power cabinet and multiple dispensers, kind of what Kempower has been doing. I think the electronic version of that will also do really well, but we also see that we, as a trucker, would like to have some predictability. For a truck, it does make a difference if you're going to a 400 kW charger or a Hypercharger with 400 kilowatts. You don't really know, am
I gonna get the 400, or is somebody going to plug in next to me and I'm only going to get the 200? And when you only get the 200, maybe you need to charge a few minutes longer and sort of extend your break beyond the legally mandated 45-minute break to really get to an SOC that you're comfortable with continuing with. So that's one of the issues. But on the other hand, I'm happy to see a lot of
Alpitronic chargers out there because they have been shown to be quite reliable. And that's, of course, the worst case - if you, as a trucker, go to a charger and it doesn't work, but you don't have any remaining driving time left. You're kind of stuck there. You need to wait 45 minutes, and then you can start finding a charger, and then you need to charge for 45 minutes again. So that's the worst case we're trying to avoid with the app.
If you know, while we are at it in the charging industry - the industry is very aware of this, and I think some of the drivers as well. There's a bit of an issue with reliability, and that's why Alpitronic has won so much market share, because they were known to be very reliable. What made their reliability? What were they doing better than others? Actually, coming back to what I mentioned earlier, this
software - they're one of the few manufacturers that actually develop a lot of the software stack in-house, including the ISO 15118 software stack. They do have expertise in that. They also have a huge team, of course - that's what you need to be able to do this in-house - but it apparently translates into higher reliability. Even though I have to say I'm not a huge fan of the user interface. I still don't understand why
as a user I need to select the plug I'm currently using, that I already plugged in. That's something the charger could recognize automatically. I don't know why they don't change that. OK. And in terms of charge point operators, is there, in all the analysis so far, some that you prefer or that you find are better than others? I mean, we're really excited about all the Ionity chargers because we know they all have 300
or 350 kilowatts. They all have liquid-cooled cables. It's a little bit interesting because now Ionity also has these mixed sites with, for example, an ABB liquid-cooled charger with 350 kilowatts and a Hypercharger 400, usually without liquid-cooled cables. For the truck driver, they need to make a decision which one to use, and I'd mostly recommend them sticking to the 350 kW liquid-cooled charger and not going to the slightly more powerful 400 kW
charger, because the power will drop and there's a big risk that somebody plugs in next to you and you only get 200 kilowatts. Yeah, the load management - that's something that many people maybe don't know or aren't as familiar with, and they wonder why they don't get the full power they were expecting. Maybe to explain to the listeners: there's always a load management on site, right? And maybe you can elaborate on what type
of strategies you have discovered so far. So this is something we take very, very seriously. This is something we've been adding to the database from day one: what is the load management at the site, and what is the peak charging power - how much can I rely on it? We have three levels: high load management, meaning there is a high probability that you'll get significantly less power, or low load management, meaning
you're almost guaranteed to get that power. High-powered charging sites are usually load-managed if it's a centrally managed one-power-cabinet-with-multiple-dispensers setup. The power of the power cabinet defines what the maximum charging speed is, and the more people plug into the same power cabinet, the lower the power. The grid connection usually matches the power of the central power cabinet. If you have multiple central power cabinets and multiple
systems, there probably is a load management going on between them as well, where they cannot actually operate every power cabinet at full capacity at the same time. Similar to when you have these all-in-one systems from Alpitronic, for example - if you have 10 chargers with 400 kilowatts each, they cannot all operate at that power at the same time. Which is a little bit wasteful because you have AC-to-DC power converters on
site that can't be fully utilized. That's why these satellite systems, where it's one central power cabinet, have some advantages - because you only have exactly as many AC/DC converters as you have grid connection. Yeah, and there's also peak shaving going on sometimes by the charge point operator, not only to protect the circuit breaker limit at the grid connection point, but also to save some money on the peak they have to pay for - the DSO, right? Yeah, if they're smart, they have a
peak shaving limiter in there as well. But the question, of course, for the CPO is: OK, where do I actually set the limit? Because if I expect the site to be at full occupancy regularly, I should probably be willing to pay for the full grid fees. If I think it was a fluke, and I actually don't think the rest of the year there'll ever be a situation where everything is in use at the
same time, then it doesn't make sense to give the user the power, even though I could, even though the grid connection is there, even though everything's ready. But if you do peak shaving, you're not giving the user as much power as you could, because you're trying to save money. And one thing that is also interesting, I think, is the difference between trucks and passenger vehicles. So the EV driver that knows the charging peak it can get from a
350 kW Ionity or whatever other charging operator - they rarely reach, or never reach, at this point in time. Most of the vehicles are still capped because of the onboard electronics, right. So you have a 400 volt system, and it mostly can get - I think Porsche was the first 800 volt vehicle, but actually the voltage of the battery doesn't play
any role in how fast the car can charge. The only thing that matters is battery temperature and SoC. The voltage only means essentially whether the charging cable going from the charger to the vehicle is a limiting factor or not. Because these cables can typically, if they're uncooled, only handle up to 500 amps for a short amount of time. And that's just the advantage of an 800 volt system, is that
you can, with the right charger, do 500 amps continuously. And that's sort of what we see happening. And that gets you to almost 400 kW, and that's what most trucks are actually pulling. But isn't the power the multiplication of the current and the voltage? So if you have 800 volts, you would have double as much as 400 volts. So if you have 800 volts, you can get the same charging power with half the charging
current. And the limiting factor - the current would be half, yeah, sure. And the limiting factor is usually the charging cable from the charger to the vehicle. There, if you have an uncooled cable, it helps a lot to have an 800 volt system. Trucks have a bigger cable than passenger vehicles - that's the reason they can charge at those high levels of power. Trucks can go up to 400 kW. They can actually go much higher. So 400 kW
doesn't really challenge a truck battery because, if it's 600 kWh of total energy capacity, the C-rate - which is the relation between charging power and battery capacity - isn't very high. So they could probably charge with 800 kW as well. That would then start to be interesting, which is great, because that means you don't really need to precondition the batteries before the truck charges. Passenger cars need to be very carefully
brought up to temperature, so you need to preheat the battery, which actually wastes quite a lot of energy. Then you plug in and it can charge really fast, but if it charges really fast, there are also a lot of losses and then you need to cool down the battery again. So everything you warm up the battery, you later have to cool down again. That's great with trucks - you don't need to really precondition
and you always charge quite quickly. Because what happens if you charge a battery at a low temperature - the battery management system will simply not allow a high current, and you'll be stuck with low charging power because the battery would get damaged if the battery management system wouldn't limit the power. Yes, so that's the whole game with preconditioning: you avoid damaging the battery on the one hand, and on the other hand you enable the battery to charge at higher currents and
therefore higher power, which is a big topic. I think in one of the last videos I was watching, it was also looking at how each OEM has made the logic of the preconditioning work - that's something the OEM decides. You as a user don't have so much flexibility. And I think it affects the trucker in his day-to-day as
well - how this preconditioning works in the planning. As I said, trucks don't need that much preconditioning because the charging power isn't that big compared to the total battery capacity. But what I did find very interesting is that most trucks have a way to limit the charging power, and even the default is usually to charge at a lower power, and you need to individually click a button to unlock the full power. I'm not quite sure if
it's due to battery longevity, or because of load management they think it's easier, but that's something to be aware of. If your truck isn't charging as quickly as you were hoping, check if that's not the issue. And talking about the tours of each trucker - how can I imagine it? Is it very fixed for each week, or also - I mean, sometimes you see these changes in the week in Toby's videos - so how frequently is this plan
disrupted in terms of: oh, there's a new order coming in. What Toby does is relatively representative of what the typical long-haul trucker does, meaning that, yes, you're constantly looking for stuff to transport from A to B, and you're always trying to find a return load. When you go somewhere, you're trying to get something on the way back. There are different markets where you can sort of
get that, but those usually don't pay as well, so you probably earn more money on the way there and try to just cover your costs on the way back. That's typical for a long-haul trucker, but as I said, there are also a lot of trucks just doing the same route every day, or having a weekly schedule that looks the same every week. It's a tough job. It's not sleeping at home
many times, and being in all kinds of situations. It's a hard life, and I greatly respect the service they do. Everything we own was in a truck at some point, and we need to help them decarbonize and go electric, but it's not a given, and we need to be thankful. And talking a bit about the trucker life behind the curtain - so everybody who's watched the videos, and who hasn't recommended
watching the Electrohocker videos? What's the behind-the-curtains that you get to know of Toby? He's great. He's super honest. He tells it like it is, and so it's not that much different behind the curtains. But it is a hard life and he makes it look easy, and I think that's something we need to keep in mind - that we
need to support our truckers with the right tools to make it happen, because not everybody comes from the charging industry and has all this knowledge. We just talked about charging power and how to use all the payment devices and do all the settings. That's hard stuff, and that's also a role for us: to educate truck drivers on how to drive an electric truck. But will
truckers also use a credit card just to pay, or to make it easy? For trucks, typically, truck drivers so far don't really get issued a company credit card. It's something that wouldn't be a huge issue, and in other markets - in America, for example - it's normal to issue a credit card. You can even have something called a merchant category code restricted credit card, which means you can only use this credit card
for specific services - so, for example, just for charging, or just for charging and washing your car. For passenger vehicles, I had some hope for this kind of card to become more common. But right now, I think we all agree the system is kind of broken. The price you pay per kWh with the credit card is more of a price signal to the other players in the ecosystem: hey, this is my initial offer,
come to me, let's negotiate a better price. If you pay with a credit card, you're kind of the loser and not really getting the price you deserve. I think that's a tragedy and it's really sad. I would love to see more dynamic pricing as well. I love on-peak and off-peak pricing. Our infrastructure is very valuable. Soon we'll have more cars and trucks
on the road than infrastructure, and we need to balance things out. The best way we can do that, and the fairest way, is by making it more expensive when we have high demand and less expensive during off-peak hours, spreading out the load. It's not great that we don't really have the systems for that, because I think CPOs are willing to go this way, but the way we currently have it set up, with MSPs in the
middle, they can't really forward those dynamic prices so well to the end customers. So we're in a system that's kind of like a Nash equilibrium or a prisoner's dilemma, where everybody's behaving according to their own best interest but we're not at the system optimal. We need some sort of jolt or change in the rules - even though I'm not a big fan of regulation. I think we've over-regulated the charging ecosystem quite a lot right now.
But we need some shock to the system to get us into a better equilibrium. Going in that direction, having a spot-market orientation with dynamic prices for a trucker would enable charging at an even lower price, right at noon when there's lots of sun. I mean, the question is what you want to optimize for. Do you want to optimize for congestion at the charging site - so when you have a lot of
demand and you want to avoid waiting lines - or do you want to optimize for the energy purchase and enable offering the lowest prices by going really low when the price is negative, for example? Historically, I've been more of a fan of on-peak and off-peak pricing to manage congestion, but I'm warming up more and more to dynamic pricing as well, because it's just more predictable - you know exactly, OK, next week, what the price will be at
A certain time, but it's still time-variable and still spreads out the demand. But more and more I'm warming up to the idea of having the day-ahead prices or the spot market prices go straight to the vehicle. If you make it transparent, it seems like a fine idea. And when the truckers have these long hours during the night, do you even see bidirectional charging? Where it's - what was it - 9 hours or 10 hours? So yeah, what
we have is flexibility. The question is how do we use that flexibility? Do we use that flexibility - they're there for 9 hours - to lower the charging power to maybe 100 kilowatts and just charge for 5, 6, 7 hours? Or do we say, OK, let's actually install a fast charger, put a 300 kilowatt charger there, and delay charging until the electricity is really cheap in the night, and then you charge that up. And then you can
go one step further and say, OK, let's put a maybe slightly higher-power charger. And during that one hour where it's really cheap, we load up on energy, and then we discharge it later in the night when it may be more expensive. But then we need to recharge it really quickly before we go. So then you have more demands on the infrastructure. Unfortunately, what I see is that the
nighttime, when most of these cars or trucks are stationary, in the energy market isn't the most interesting time of the day. So I'm a little bit concerned that the charging losses that you have to a certain extent don't fully compensate. If the truck is stationary over the day - and that might be a trend we see - maybe at some point a logistics company says, hey, let's flip this around, let's drive at night,
because on the Brenner, for example, electric trucks are now allowed to drive at night. And that might flip everything and we say, OK, actually during the day we can charge really cheaply on solar energy. For the truck driver, of course, it's not so nice because then they need to drive at night. But if it makes economic sense, yeah, that might - also thinking of longer time periods at night, but then during the weekend, or think about
stuff like autonomous vehicles that might also affect your business model eventually. So talking about that and getting towards the end of the podcast - what are trends that you are particularly excited about in the electric trucker world, in macro trends, and how they would affect your business? So right now I'm mostly worried about AI and how that's going to affect all our jobs. For trucking
in particular, autonomous driving has gone through a few hype cycles now. It should be possible at some point. But the question then is how does recharging actually work? And that was kind of fun at NIO - we already had a system that was fully automated, so battery swap is something you can do without anybody inside, and the car can sort of replenish itself. When
we have autonomous cars or trucks, we also need to think of autonomous and automatic charging solutions. I saw a lot of failed projects with charging robots that sort of plug in from the side, and inductive charging isn't going to be relevant for trucks at all. With inductive charging, of course, you have even more charging losses. You kind of need to have something similar to an onboard charger inside the vehicle,
because the AC waves need to be converted into DC power for the battery. So as much power as you want to have inductively, you need a pretty big AC-to-DC converter in the car. So I don't believe that will be happening. But you could also have an underbody device that sort of touches the vehicle and gives power through that. But that's, of course, also on the underside of
the vehicle, which is very delicate, and I don't know how robust such a system must be. For trucks, I haven't really found a better automatic replenishing system than battery swapping. And I think battery swapping for trucks could be booming - in China it's a game changer, it perfectly works there. CATL is betting on it now. CATL has a system. We were at a company called e-Haul, which near Berlin in Germany has a demonstrator for a great
battery swap system for trucks. You just go in from the side. It's even much simpler than for passenger vehicles. A NIO Power Swap Station is a marvel of technology and super complex. For trucks you can make it much simpler, also because you don't need to worry about ride comfort. The NIO Power Swap Station is made super smooth so that you don't feel scared or anything while you're inside the vehicle. But for trucks
you don't need all of that and you can make it super simple, super fast. So if autonomous trucks come, I bet truck battery swapping will also be around the corner. Alright, and is there any last message or ways people can contact you? Yeah, please go ahead and download the eTrucker app, check it out for yourself. We'd love some feedback on certain sites you might have visited before.
If you work for a charge point operator and want to learn more about how to make your sites more truck-friendly, we'd love to help out with site designs, because we've seen all kinds of layouts and some are better than others. The charge port position is a big topic there as well. Yeah, have fun and let's get heavy-duty trucking
electric. Thanks a lot and best of luck. Thank you. And this was the episode with Michael Clarke from the Electric Trucker. Impressive background, multicultural, and especially working at so many interesting companies and in such varied roles - starting from Tesla, where he had to convince hotel owners to install chargers, but also at Porsche in interesting aspects really related to route planning and how to integrate into the vehicles and different voltage, high-voltage levels in the Taycan, which was the most impressive EV of the first era of EV history, and then
of course NIO on charging in the ecosystem there for swapping, and what we learned on swapping experiences, prices, and especially the dynamic tariff for EV drivers at home, being one of the first smart charging apps in the market. I also liked how he compared the different pace of innovation, and especially the Chinese one, and what we can learn from there - just the pace of innovation and maybe sometimes you just launch a feature for free. And at least the features are there, and finally, of
course, the most important bit of the interview with the Electric Trucker. Even though the market is still in its infancy, it will probably grow as fast as he anticipated - in my view too - considering that long-haul trucks and generally logistics companies really care about total cost of ownership, and the prices of these trucks have fallen dramatically and the operational costs are very, very low compared to diesel. There are more and more restrictions as well, and indeed the feasibility, which is the main
counter-objection to using them, has been displayed by Toby - whose videos are super entertaining for the geeks among us that like these topics; I would recommend watching them. It is possible today, and not only in some select countries but even all over Europe, to drive these electric trucks. I found the details and the technicalities of charging power levels that we explored with him fascinating, but also how charge point operators and chargers differ from one another and the differences
in prices in particular, and where the whole industry is going, and of course all the features that the Electric Trucker app has and will have. Particularly interesting, and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. If you did, share it with those in your network that you think will like it, and let's participate in this transition towards e-trucks by sharing it and commenting on it. See you soon.
节目笔记
What does it take to make heavy-duty electrification practical on Europe’s roads? In this episode, Michael Clarke, co-creator of eTrucker, joins us to talk about building a driver-first charging app for electric trucks. With experience from Tesla, Porsche and NIO, Michael shares how the team designed a tool that helps drivers find truly truck-ready charging - complete with filters for pull-through bays, overnight parking and realistic routing. The e-Trucker story is grounded in real-world driving. Co-founder Tobias Wagner logged 100,000 electric truck kilometres in just one year to shape the database, which launched with 575 truck-suitable charging parks. Within months, community contributions added more than a hundred sites, creating Europe’s largest driver-verified dataset for truck-capable infrastructure. Highlights include: - What “truck-ready” means in practice, from site geometry to services that matter for HGVs - How driver feedback loops improve data quality and verification - The roadmap ahead for live availability, bookings and scaling across Europe You can explore the app on iOS (https://apps.apple.com/de/app/etrucker/id6746111803) or Android (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.etrucker). And to see the story behind the drivers building the future of e-trucking, watch one of their videos here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U4Uz-tzaJw&t=521s&ab_channel=Elektrotrucker. This is a hands-on look at how data, feedback and determination are shaping the tools that will make long-haul electrification work.