Battery swapping was possibly viable when charging speeds were low. Now I drive for two hours, get a coffee and use the toilets while the car gets another 100 miles of range. There are far more 24/7 charging locations then there will ever be battery swap locations and there will never be a situation when there are no charged batteries to be swapped. We have a charging infrastructure. Where is the battery swapping infrastructure?
For passenger cars, Europe and the United States have missed the window. Battery swapping now competes directly with public charging networks. NIO made swapping its core strategy from day one and has already built more than 3,000 stations, putting the company close to profitability. Installing similar stations in Europe or the United States would cost far more (NIO is likely shipping the units from China), and success hinges on standardisation. In Europe, fragmented national interests and limited cooperation between companies make that hard to achieve.
# On Battery Swapping: Where It Works and Where It Doesn't
I remain skeptical of battery swapping for passenger cars. NIO's finances appear dire, and while CATL might invest heavily—hoping to corner the market through platform standardization—the economics remain questionable. Swap stations are simply too expensive.
Battery swapping makes perfect sense for 2/3 wheelers. Small batteries mean cheap swap stations, local networks can scale gradually, and these vehicles rarely need highway infrastructure. The model has already taken off across Asian markets—India, Indonesia, and Taiwan.
Commercial trucking presents another viable application. Downtime carries high opportunity costs, making swap stations economically justified. In Australia, given our vast distances and the world's largest trucks, this model seems inevitable.
Mining trucks targeting full electrification within ten years remain an open question—whether through battery swapping or high-speed charging is unclear.
What's your view on overhead charging cables for highways? Europe and India are trialling them for commercial trucks. Are there Chinese experiments worth noting?
Analysts expect NIO to break even by the end of 2026, and the company has already said that cities such as Shanghai should hit profitability soon. Ultimately it’s a volume game: an OEM needs scale. For a premium brand like NIO, reaching high EV volumes takes longer than it does for mass-market players like BYD.
With CATL and other OEMs on board, the sector can push harder on standardisation. CATL has just launched two standardised battery packs under its Choco-Swap ecosystem.
I skipped battery swapping for two- and three-wheelers because I’ll cover it in a future piece, but the model works. Gogoro in Taiwan proves the point; its network already supports more than 600,000 vehicles. Again, daily swap volume is the metric that matters.
Overhead charging cables for highways remain costly pilot projects. Heavy trucks will take longer to electrify because range and weight rule the economics. Countries will have to roll out megawatt chargers and probably boost the grid or use batteries as buffers.
Battery swapping was possibly viable when charging speeds were low. Now I drive for two hours, get a coffee and use the toilets while the car gets another 100 miles of range. There are far more 24/7 charging locations then there will ever be battery swap locations and there will never be a situation when there are no charged batteries to be swapped. We have a charging infrastructure. Where is the battery swapping infrastructure?
For passenger cars, Europe and the United States have missed the window. Battery swapping now competes directly with public charging networks. NIO made swapping its core strategy from day one and has already built more than 3,000 stations, putting the company close to profitability. Installing similar stations in Europe or the United States would cost far more (NIO is likely shipping the units from China), and success hinges on standardisation. In Europe, fragmented national interests and limited cooperation between companies make that hard to achieve.
# On Battery Swapping: Where It Works and Where It Doesn't
I remain skeptical of battery swapping for passenger cars. NIO's finances appear dire, and while CATL might invest heavily—hoping to corner the market through platform standardization—the economics remain questionable. Swap stations are simply too expensive.
Battery swapping makes perfect sense for 2/3 wheelers. Small batteries mean cheap swap stations, local networks can scale gradually, and these vehicles rarely need highway infrastructure. The model has already taken off across Asian markets—India, Indonesia, and Taiwan.
Commercial trucking presents another viable application. Downtime carries high opportunity costs, making swap stations economically justified. In Australia, given our vast distances and the world's largest trucks, this model seems inevitable.
Mining trucks targeting full electrification within ten years remain an open question—whether through battery swapping or high-speed charging is unclear.
What's your view on overhead charging cables for highways? Europe and India are trialling them for commercial trucks. Are there Chinese experiments worth noting?
Analysts expect NIO to break even by the end of 2026, and the company has already said that cities such as Shanghai should hit profitability soon. Ultimately it’s a volume game: an OEM needs scale. For a premium brand like NIO, reaching high EV volumes takes longer than it does for mass-market players like BYD.
With CATL and other OEMs on board, the sector can push harder on standardisation. CATL has just launched two standardised battery packs under its Choco-Swap ecosystem.
I skipped battery swapping for two- and three-wheelers because I’ll cover it in a future piece, but the model works. Gogoro in Taiwan proves the point; its network already supports more than 600,000 vehicles. Again, daily swap volume is the metric that matters.
Overhead charging cables for highways remain costly pilot projects. Heavy trucks will take longer to electrify because range and weight rule the economics. Countries will have to roll out megawatt chargers and probably boost the grid or use batteries as buffers.