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Comment by adrianN | Hacker News Reader

I would expect that in the near future EVs become commodities based on a small handful of licensed platforms. Owning the charging network is a nice hedge against losing the battle to become one of the platforms.

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>> Owning the charging network is a nice hedge against losing the battle to become one of the platforms.

Charging networks are IMHO not a viable long term business model. Building out a "platform" to sell commodity electrons is utterly stupid. Nobody wants the stupid app, they want to charge at McDonalds along the highway while they grab something to eat.

>Charging networks are IMHO not a viable long term business model.

Sort of like gas stations weren't a viable long-term business model?

> Nobody wants the stupid app, they want to charge at McDonalds along the highway while they grab something to eat.

So you should put your chargers near convenient amenities... like a convenience store... like a gas station?

Tesla isn’t building C-Stores that sell Gas or Electrons. The superchargers I’ve seen are in some random parking lot without a restroom or convenience store selling stuff.

Some of them, but I've also seen Tesla at various truck stops. In rural areas building at a convenience store make sense: they already have restrooms, some form of restaurant and various other things to buy on site - everything a traveler needs for a quick break to fill the car before getting back on the road.

In cities I think we will see less chargers as most people just go home to charge. However in poor areas they will be at places like grocery stores so you those who don't have at-home charging can charge and shop.

Not quite. Gas stations don't have enough to keep a person busy for an entire charge session. You need real shopping or a place to sit down to eat. They will also not be needed in town near your home, since people will just charge at home.

Norway is perhaps a bit special, but this is very common for service stations along the roads or in Oslo to have many fast chargers. You can buy a drink or some food, and most have some space to sit down.

I remember the first time I visited a gas station in Belgium (?) off the highway that actually had 10 or so "standing tables" to eat at from the two restaurant options in the building. We sit for 4+ hours between fill-ups; why do we not see this as the standard in most places, with more limited seating for the elderly/disabled or children who cannot reach a full height standing table?

As an American, it was really eye opening!

> Sort of like gas stations weren't a viable long-term business model?

If you only sell gas and nothing else you can only compete on price. Good luck with that.

Infrastructure (to provide fuel or energy for transportation) is a long term business model.

Aren't superchargers just the endpoint? Isn't the actual infrastructure mostly the power/energy companies?

Yes, but those already have most of the needed infrastructure. Most gas stations have enough power to run a couple level chargers - they just don't have the chargers (note I said 1 or 2 chargers, not 8+ which is what anyone serious about charging needs to install)

Why would this be true for EVs when it's clearly not true for ICE vehicles?

Maybe, but a charging network is not quite a trillion dollar business, not to mention that the charging network will also become a commodity (especially since the charging protocol is open)

I disagree. People like their car to look new/different, and volumes on cars are high enough that the advantages of a custom platform is worth the cost of designing it.

The design of the car is only loosely related to the skateboard that contains the battery and the drivetrain.

Skateboard makes even less sense for EVs than for ICEs. in an ICE you have a large engine and various axels that have to be in specific places. With an EV you have more room to move the motors around where they makes sense. While you need a lot of batteries, each cell is small, so you want to put things like seats in the car first and then add cells anywhere there is extra room.

Yeah some cars (like the polestar) have really shallow rear-seat legroom, which was a total showstopper. They could have move some of those batteries to the trunk/frunk

They could, but there is also a cost to separating the batteries. More cables, which means more resistance, which means inefficiency. Not to mention the extra design and manufacturing costs.

In practice, I don't think any company is meaningfully splitting up their battery pack to take advantage of "better" packaging logistics elsewhere in the frame/body. I know in this example, they could still likely be loosely attached in the same plane, but with less density under the cabin, but I think my point holds.

Considering 90% of modern consumer automobiles use a monocoque frame the design means everything to the chassis

All cars made by the Volkswagen group are based on like 20 platforms. For example the Audi A3 and the Skoda Yeti are the same platform. They look quite different.

> People like their car to look new/different

That's true in my experience. Though it is interesting that cars look more and more similar over time rather than different.

There are probably two main answers to that.

- People generally like their vehicles to look different but not too different. Design of everything is a fashion industry.

- Fuel efficiency, practicality, and safety requirements all lead to a certain level of convergence.

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