Cox Automotive, a Atlanta-based provider of automotive products and services, has taken over Spiers New Technologies (SNT), a firm that offers repair, refurbishing, remanufacturing, and repurposing services for EV battery packs.
Through this acquisition, Cox Automotive seeks to make its way into the thriving electric vehicle (EV) battery lifecycle market.
According to Cox, the purchase would help the firm establish its battery repair offerings, especially as EVs take center stage.
It claims that electric vehicles have radically different service profiles than their internal combustion engine counterparts, with the battery playing a big role. Support for electric vehicle batteries is very important since the battery pack can contribute up to 40% of the vehicle's cost.
Despite robust investments in electric vehicles and more automakers announce billion-dollar investments to expand their EV businesses, people still seems to refrain from purchasing EVs.
According to a research conducted by Cox, eight out of ten customers who are not considering buying an electric vehicle claims to have concerns regards its battery value and usable life.
Incidentally, the Spiers acquisition is not Cox's first attempt into EV battery management. The company has collaborated with SNT on a battery health diagnostic tool that runs on Spiers' Alfred software platform. Cox said that the diagnostic tool would boost consumer confidence in electric vehicles.
Cox will also gain a share in the battery refurbishing business as part of the deal. Spiers is one of only few companies that specialize in giving EV batteries a "second life" after outliving their usefulness in a vehicle.
In an interview earlier this year, SNT said that 80 per cent to 90 per cent of the batteries it receives come from OEMs, with the balance coming from auto wreckers. It's a business segment that will only increase as more EVs hit the road, so Cox is expected to get a piece of the end-of-life market as well.
Source Credit - https://techcrunch.com/2021/09/01/cox-automotive-acquires-battery-health-company-spiers-as-evs-take-center-stage/