Electric vehicles have entered the mainstream in key regions, with new EV sales surpassing a 20% market share in the EU and reaching 30% in the UK. But second-hand values have been suppressed by buyer concerns. One of the key worries is battery age. Although the fearmongering about needing to replace EV batteries after three years has proven to be mostly mythical, the true capacity of a second-hand battery remains in question. Austrian business AVILOO reckons it has the answer with its battery testing technology. I talked to CEO Marcus Berger about how his company could lubricate the second-hand EV market.
AVILOO Gets FLASH-y
The PREMIUM Test is great for end users, but running a car from 100% to 10% is too time consuming for dealerships, which led to AVILOO developing its FLASH Test. “The PREMIUM Test delivers us all the data that we need to perform the FLASH Test,” says Berger. “The FLASH Test has been developed as our second product based on the requirements of the market – the car dealers and the auction houses, the BCAs, the Coxes of this world, the Mercedes.” These companies would not sit in a client’s car for the time required to complete the PREMIUM Test. “We had to develop something that was quick, easy, and could be applied in a standstill mode, but still be accurate and technologically sophisticated. That was how the FLASH Test was born. It took us a year to develop.” The new test was launched at the beginning of 2023. “That was the breakthrough for our company, but also for EV battery testing within the industry.”
However, the FLASH Test doesn’t just sample where the car is on its curve. It’s not just a statistical analysis. “We collect a lot of predictors from the battery management system,” says Berger. “We combine those predictors. We know approximately how to value those from all the PREMIUM Test data, and then we can assess the state of health. There are some predictors such as age and mileage, there are predictors such as the amount of the charging patterns that the specific car had. We use approximately 20 parameters.”
Telematics companies such as Geotab manage thousands of EVs and use the data they collect to offer some very convincing analysis about the durability of electric car batteries. However, Berger argues that as this is based on State-of-Charge percentages from the automaker’s Battery Management System, AVILOO’s data is more accurate. “We generated the world’s largest independent EV battery data with over a million battery tests performed, covering all kind of models at different ages and different mileages,” says Berger. “This database is extremely powerful. The battery management systems built into cars are not designed to make an accurate state of health calculation. They don’t have the computing power or the inherent methodology to do that correctly.”
Most EVs are driven daily with a state of charge between 20 and 80%, and only infrequently charged to 100% or depleted close to 0%. “The battery management system wouldn’t have sufficient data to make a correct state of health calculation,” says Berger. “You also never know how old the state of health that is being shown in the BMS display is. It could be a year old. On top of that, there is no standard methodology on state of health calculation. That’s why it needs us to make it standardized, always using the same methodology for every car and therefore making state of health comparable.”
AVILOO Puts Its Money Where Its Battery Health Certificate Is
Whether the PREMIUM or FLASH test has been performed, the result is a certificate of current vehicle battery health. This certificate can be used to guarantee the remaining battery life of a used EV. “This can be used when the car is sold,” says Berger. “Some consumers would just do it because they’re interested. But the main use case for us is proving the battery condition at time of sale. Consumers do that with the PREMIUM Test and the industry, B2B clients use the FLASH Test. They can display the certificate together with the pictures of the car on the used car platform and make the battery condition transparent so that everyone who wants to buy this car knows what they’re getting for their money.”
AVILOO claims this has been a major benefit for the second-hand electric car market. “The impact is huge,” says Berger. “Five years ago, used EVs didn’t sell. Nobody wanted to buy them.” The fear of a $30,000 battery replacement was a major disincentive. “Before we came to the market, there was battery fear. Then we came into the market. We could prove that batteries are in good condition. By bringing that transparency, we brought trust. Consumers want to have that trust and because consumers want it, car dealers need it. Now used EVs are selling because most of the cars have a battery certificate from AVILOO. That’s why these large brands work with us – Mercedes, Cox, BCA.”
Dealers have also had a positive reaction from displaying AVILOO battery health data with their used EVs. “They get more clicks on their ads with a battery certificate attached to them,” claims Berger. “They have reduced standing time for used cars on the lot. The EVs sell far quicker. The bids can be higher by up to 10%, which almost doubles the profit.”
AVILOO stands so firmly behind its battery state of health data that it has just released its own guarantee. “Not only are we providing a battery test, but we are now adding a battery warranty to it,” says Berger. “If our data is wrong, we stand behind it with the financial consequence, which means £2,700 ($3,600) for everyone, where we cannot keep our promise, and our promise is 12 months or 20,000km. If your SOH degrades faster than we predicted, you get £2,700. That’s a revolutionary product because it combines analysis with financial backing. We stand behind what we say, and we suffer financially if we are wrong.”
This will work in parallel with manufacturer battery warranties. “It’s a different product,” says Berger. “Manufacturers give a general warranty, usually for 8 years or 160,000 kilometers, whichever you achieve earlier, for 70% state of health. You must prove that. We had some clients who went into a legal dispute. The manufacturer would make an assessment about a warranty case. There is no independent organization stating that. We might say the state of health is 68% in a warranty case and OEMs have accepted that.”
AVILOO: Delivering Battery Trust
The PREMIUM Test currently isn’t available in the UK, although it can be purchased in many other European countries. This may change, but the FLASH Test is already widely in use in Britain. I found several online UK auto resellers mentioning AVILOO, with some even displaying test certificates along with their EV inventory. “It’s an annual license fee for the AVILOO box (€480 / $550) and then it’s €35 ($40) per test,” says Berger. “We work with MotorCheck as our reselling partner. We work with BCA and Cox, all the big fish. We are very well established within the UK EV remarketing industry. BCA tests every used EV with our technology. So does Cox.”
The AVILOO offering will continue to develop. “We are going to further improve the AVILOO battery test,” says Berger. “We are going to add additional safety features. We are going to add more sophisticated insurance products. We’ll turn the company into an EV remarketing expert.” OBD-II can deliver a lot more information than just the battery usage data, such as about the drivetrain. “Eventually, those are components that are important to understand the quality of. The battery is the most expensive one, and it’s a must have, but the drivetrain and the inverter, which is part of the drivetrain, are expensive parts too, and they can get damaged.”
“The core issue that we solve is the structured trust problem and we invented the battery test to do that,” concludes Berger. AVILOO’s battery warranty further enhances that. “We built the world’s largest independent EV battery database. We put financial consequence into our certificates. We stand behind them. The consumer can enjoy the benefits, and we are boosting the used EV market and thus boosting the new EV market because there is no new EV market without the well-functioning used EV market. We contribute to one of the most important societal issues by shifting mobility from combustion engines to electromobility.”
