Good-bye, gas stations

In 2007, Shai Agassi quit his senior position at German software giant SAP to found his own start-up, Better Place. Now the brainchild of the 41-year old software mogul is poised to turn Israel into a primer on how to get an entire nation off of gas and into electric cars.

On Wednesday, automakers met at the Frankfurt motor show, where the focus was on implementing green technology in the crisis-hit automotive industry. Agassi was there to answer reporters' questions about his company's plans for expansion into other European markets.

What is the reason you were not successful in Germany?

I don’t know, you need to ask them. We tried both with utilities as well as with car makers. We were, I think, misunderstood by some of the players in the market. We’re great enablers and we’re great partners. If you ask Renault, they’ll tell us how great a partner we are.

With all the talk of green car technology, is this a historic event for the auto industry?

Last time any change, any massive change in the automotive sector happened, was 101 years ago…we had the Ford Model T come in, and for the first time had massive production of cars. Since then, for 101 years, pretty much everybody followed the Ford model. The car design, the business model, everything was the same as Ford Model T. Better looking faster cars, bigger, more convenient, but the result? If Henry Ford came here and opened every one of the cars, he’ll know what it is. He’ll know every single component in them. If you opened the books for every one of the companies, he’ll know the business model. You sell cheap and make money on the parts.

That model has failed us. Both on the oil side and the business model in the last year. Its time for renewable, its time for renewal. The renewable source has to come from the sun and from solar power and wind. The renewal has to come in the form of a new business model, new products and new demand from people...

What we’re seeing is, this is the time when cars are available, the infrastructure is available. And a new business model is available for carmakers, that is more profitable, and more sustainable. Not just in the environment but also on the economic side.

You’re collaborating with Renault, which is a French manufacturer, yet there has been no breakthrough with the French government for distribution.

The French government has done tremendous work on creating work streams... and they’re progressing very nicely. I can’t announce what the French government will announce, but I think there is good progress in France.

What is the timetable on implementation in other European countries?

Roughly, a roll out in France is in the order of magnitude of 18-24 months. Roll out in Israel is about 12 months, just to give you perspective. If France starts today, they’ll be ready for the cars when the cars roll out.

How many recharger points will be available before the cars debut in Israel?

In Israel, what you’ll see is every car will have two charge spots, one at home and one at work, before the car shows up. As your car comes in, you’ll have the two most important spots. There will be tens of thousands in the streets, and at retail locations, and malls and sports arenas, to add to the numbers. We're looking at probably about 100,000 plus charge spots.

What sort of investment was necessary to facillitate this in Israel?

We’ve raised 200 million dollars (135.4 million euros) for the global company, we raised about 150 million dollars for Denmark. We are in a similar round in Israel. So we are well funded to put this infrastructure in the ground.

Two years ago, I heard you were in good conversations with Spain?

We’ve had conversations with, I think, 50 countries around the world, and there is a limit to how many we can do at any point in time. We wanted governments that actually put policies in place and made this an important national project. We can always come to a country in two or three years time and copy what we have in Israel- it's very easy to copy Israel to another country. We wanted to pick the first countries where the government was behind the project and supportive.

Do you need the government?

We don’t need the government, but you don’t want to go against the government. If you went into Germany as an example, and every state decided on a different standard for the plug, a different way, it would be impossible to do. If you think about it, you have the RWE’s and Neons of the world, but Mannheim makes its own electricity, and Stuttgart makes its own electricity. You start looking at this thing, if every location was different, it’s like having gas stations with square nozzles and round nozzles and triangle. You need government to basically say, this is the standard across the country, here are the policies we are putting in place, here is the tax policy. With that we can work a lot easier.

What kind of partner do you need besides the government?

Usually what we find are partners that are energy companies, for example, Danish Oil and Natural Gas, in Denmark. Also financial institutes, for example Morgan Stanley. And utilities- Israeli Utilities is partnering with us in Israel.

Which energy will you use in Israel?

In every place we go, we only use renewable energy. France is a bit of a difference, because in effect, an existing nuclear plant.

We only use renewable energy sources. In Israel, for example we're putting a bid for the first 100,000 cars. We're going to buy about a hundred megawatts of solar power. We work with utility to feed it into the grid. Whatever we don’t need, we feed it into the grid, and we take it back at off peak hours.

Is there any place in the United States, where you could follow that model?

Everywhere. Everywhere. Bay area. Bay area we’ve announced, and we’ll be about a year behind Australia. Roughly. If you look at the Bay area, you could drive all five million cars on the wind and solar in the Bay area, there’s enough of it.