Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
The Cybertruck is not for introverts - The future of EV Charging with Christopher Maiwald
522 Plays6 months ago
Welcome to the Plug In For More podcast! Mike, Tom, and Bryant are here to help you on your journey to an Electric vehicle future. Each episode we discuss current events, trends, and a specific topic of education related to EV's. We bring together a diverse experience set, and pair it with guests who are experts in the field. For even more information on EV's, check out www.EVUniverse.com.
In this episode we celebrate Mike _finally_ getting his Cybertruck. Tune in to hear his take on the newest member of the Tesla family!
Be sure to follow PIFM on our various social media platforms, for more exciting content on EV’s
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pifm_podcast/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PIFMPodcast
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqXpv3fnOcv-robjLbDINFQ/featured
Recommended
Transcript
Bryant's Absence and Podcast Introduction
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome back to the plugin for more podcast. Once again, we are Bryant less. We've been trying to get him to come back to our show, but he's on vacation. I'm not sure where he is this time. Some fancy car show in California. I think so. Yeah. It's a non EV related. So he's dead to me at the moment. Um, he's just, uh, again, a way gallivanting across the globe. It's a tough life, but I'm glad that someone gets to do it. Yeah. It's not you or me. No.
00:00:29
Speaker
Welcome to Plug In For More, brought to you by evuniverse.com. EV Universe is your one-stop shop for all things related to the electric vehicle. Here on this podcast, our goal is to educate, inspire, and hopefully make your transition into the electric vehicle marketplace a lot less intimidating. And now, here are your hosts, Mike, Tom, and Bryant.
00:00:55
Speaker
But enough with him, we don't need to talk about Brian any longer. I'm just trying to figure out what he looks like. Well, I've understanding that you've become something of a local celebrity in the Greater Raleigh area.
Cybertruck and New Electric Trucks Discussion
00:01:08
Speaker
Yeah. Cyber truck. I'm not a celebrity. Let's put it that way. The truck is. And so I get this question a lot is,
00:01:20
Speaker
What's it like to own a cyber truck? Do you like it? Yeah. Give me some information that happens every single day. People ask me, what's it like? What do you think? Number one is if you're an introvert, do not buy that truck. Do not buy it. If you don't like talking to people, forget it. Just unless you're going to just keep it in your garage and no one knows you have it and you just want to look at it. Don't buy that truck. Or the other option is.
00:01:49
Speaker
maybe wrap it hot pink because it's, that'll maybe decrease the attention a little bit. I mean, it's, it's insane. It really is. Um, I've never, I mean, I've had some, I would say some, some different vehicles that would create some attention. Um, I think early on in the podcast days, we talked about my Ford GT that I had, you know, the Tesla Roadster, those things are.
00:02:16
Speaker
don't even, no one blinks an eye at those compared to the Cybertruck. I can't go anywhere without someone filming me, asking questions, pounding on the side of the truck, surrounding the vehicle while I go into the grocery store. I mean, it's insanity with this thing. That's all I really have to say. I mean, we can dive into the specifics about the truck, but it's crazy owning it.
00:02:44
Speaker
So besides owning the Cybertruck, there is, uh, you know, some more Evie trucks coming out. And I know we've talked before about the Silverado work truck that's been out with about 440 miles of range. The RST version is looks like just about out as well. Um, there's been a number of videos coming out and some long-term long road tests on it. Um, so basically the premium version of the work truck.
00:03:13
Speaker
And that thing is getting four, it's rated at 440 miles of range. Some testers are getting 460 out of this thing, including, you know, Mick driving. So that's incredible. It's got a massive battery. The charging curve is fantastic as well. So it's charging weight. You're getting a lot more mileage. I'm a lot quicker than you are with other ones. Again, a lot of that has to do with the size of the battery and the capabilities, but it's a.
00:03:39
Speaker
If you're going to be towing, I think right now that's your best option by far, if you can get your hands on one. Very cool. And that 800 volt architecture obviously lends itself to that fast charging curve. And is it the same 212 kilowatt hour battery that's in the Hummer EV? Is that what they've put in that? Yeah, it's over 200 kilowatts. I would assume it's the same battery pack. I still have a reservation for the Silverado EV, even though I declined my reservation for the Denali.
00:04:08
Speaker
I think when you look at the two, obviously there's cosmetic differences between the two of them, but for me, the biggest difference is if you look at the bed of the Denali, it's a more of a traditional truck bed, where on the Silverado, it has the avalanche type side rails. And that makes a big difference if you're going to put a top around the back of your truck or just even loading things into the back of it.
00:04:38
Speaker
I think the Silverado is kind of the one I would gravitate originally towards just on the looks but when you factor in the bed and some of the premium features on the Denali I don't know that one's pretty enticing too but both of them are $100,000 less first edition so they're not inexpensive by any means. Yeah it's a life choice not just a car.
00:05:01
Speaker
No, no. Um, but I will say that the mid gate folding down the way it does. If you're looking at throwing canoes or kayaks in the back or some, you know, longer lumber, that's a pretty useful tool.
Features and Comparisons of Silverado
00:05:15
Speaker
I mean, that that's pretty cool.
00:05:17
Speaker
And that was something that the Avalanche had years ago, which obviously the Avalanche and the Silverado EV, I see them very akin to each other. And I think that's a really cool feature. And I liked it then. And obviously GM did away with that design for a few years, but glad to see it came back.
00:05:33
Speaker
Yeah, yeah I think they've got a winner on their hands with this thing as long as they can, you know, ensure the glitches are out, such an electrical system if everything is working the way it should. I mean it's got four wheel steering it has the adaptive suspension as well so the ride height can change. I mean it's gonna have tight turning radius all that kind of stuff that goes with it.
00:05:57
Speaker
And, you know, it's more traditional. The frunk is huge on those things and a folding mid gate. I mean, in a massive battery pack and the best charging curve.
00:06:09
Speaker
for a similar price as the foundation series, uh, cyber truck in far less hideous. Hey, now that hurts my, uh, Tesla fan boy, uh, side of me and not all of me as a Tesla fan boy, but, um, yeah, it's still, still hurts. So shut a little tear.
EVUniverse Promotion and Chris Maywald Introduction
00:06:29
Speaker
you're listening to the plug in for more podcast. If you're looking for information on electric vehicles, electric vehicles components, or information on how to reduce your carbon footprint, look no further than evuniverse.com. evuniverse.com is your one stop shop for all things related to electric vehicle.
00:06:49
Speaker
So today our podcast guest is Chris Maywald, he is the CEO of Electron. Electron obviously is a name that we have heard a lot in the home charging level two, level one charging networks, as well as the adapters. Now from the time that we recorded our interview till
00:07:11
Speaker
Now there's been an issue that's popped up with the vortex adapter and we just want to be fully transparent in our conversation with electron and this issue that obviously we weren't able to address during our interview. Mike.
00:07:26
Speaker
Yeah. So, um, long story short, we had gotten one of the first vortex adapters. Um, we ended up testing along with some other adapters at a local Tesla supercharger, um, on my Rivian and there was a safety issue that was found. Um, and so contacted Chris along with, um, the YouTuber who did the video and electron has really stood behind their product in
00:07:52
Speaker
coming forward and say they're going to fix it and did so in a very expedient manner, and they're going to make things right. So if you have one of those adapters that maybe doesn't connect the way that it should, be sure to reach out to Lectron. Otherwise, it seems like their production is ramping up as it should. Chris, we want to welcome you to the Plug-In for More podcast. We would love it if you'd be able to give us a little bit about your background and the company and what it is you're doing.
00:08:23
Speaker
Sure. Electron is part of a bigger consumer technology company that I started around a little more than 10 years ago now. The first part of the business was in this smart home space and Electron as a brand has been around since 2017. What we saw in 2017 is that
00:08:45
Speaker
Nobody was focusing in the EV charging category. Nobody was focusing on direct to consumer world, and nobody was focusing on big box retail world. So we set out initially to build a brand that provides best in class value to customers, addresses the fragmentation issue in U.S. EV charging, the different charging standards between Dex, CCS, J1772.
00:09:15
Speaker
And at that time, Chatmail, and just build a consumer technology brand in the space when back in 2017, everybody was just focused on OEM business. And that's what we set out to do. And given where our products are, they're extremely successful in Amazon. They're in in-store programs and Best Buy, Home Depot, Lowe's, and a few Walmarts as well. I think we've done reasonably well at our initial mission.
00:09:42
Speaker
From your background, what made you get into EV charging? Is it just a hole in the market that you saw? Are you a big EV fan? What's kind of your background that made you want to go down this road? Because obviously creating your own company is not an easy thing. And it's an endeavor of that sort. What fed your passion to do this? Yeah.
00:10:05
Speaker
I used to do investment banking in London before I came to Asia to manufacture consumer technology products. So in terms of background, there was really nothing that predestined me for this particular role. I was working in finance and our first product line in the smart home space came out of a need that I wanted products for a certain camera that I was using.
00:10:35
Speaker
and started the company here in Asia. And in the wake of scaling that company, we became good at a couple of things. We became very good at engineering products in Asia at a really thoughtful price point that vibed well with the Amazon algorithm.
00:11:00
Speaker
That in turn translated really well to consumer products that would do well in big box retail. So after we launched our first product line on Amazon, we, after a couple of years, were able to get a vendor number with Best Buy. Then in turn, we got a vendor number with Home Depot and other leading retailers because we made stuff that was at a really compelling price point versus their features. And
00:11:25
Speaker
So as an organization, we learned how to build really good stuff that people want, and we were able to build a distribution network in North America to help us distribute those products. And from there, it was an analysis of identifying small markets that grow very, very quickly that align with our organizational strengths.
00:11:52
Speaker
So back then we were very good at selling stuff on Amazon in big box retail. And we wanted to operate in a market that could become very, very large and that was growing very quickly. And we looked at EV charging. We saw a lot of downstream synergies with our existing business on the retail and marketing side. And obviously then set out to hire an entirely new and very competent engineering team.
00:12:22
Speaker
that now consists of former Tesla people, former Gilly Automotive people, former Foxconn people.
00:12:29
Speaker
that are helping us build best-in-class products and distribute them through our network. Makes sense. So one of the things that comes up with EV charging that we hear a lot, people have questions about their cars, is what adapters do they need to use? But then the next biggest question is, what about the safety of these things? And there's been a bunch of people on X and Facebook that will bring up off-brand chargers, especially as the
00:12:58
Speaker
uh nacs and the the supercharger adapters are coming out for you know the ford and rivians and obviously the other oams shortly um you know when i when i look at that i mean you guys have been a known brand for a long time um there's some other newer brands are coming out there's some ones that are um frankly on amazon but we don't know necessarily where they're coming from
Safety Standards and Charging Solutions
00:13:21
Speaker
Can you talk about what you guys go through from an even compliance standpoint, but also just a safety standpoint to make sure that these chargers are not going to cause problems with these vehicles and are safe to use versus some of these other ones in the aftermarket are big question marks. So we go through testing with nationally certified labs.
00:13:48
Speaker
Those labs could be UL or ETL or SGS, but other nationally recognized labs. And then we test according to standards that are largely set by UL. Until a couple of months ago, all of our adapters were tested according to UL 2251. Recently, UL recognizing the need and the importance of adapters going forward.
00:14:14
Speaker
published a dedicated standard specifically for adapters called UL 2252. And after that the draft was released, we reviewed it and we started testing our adapters according to UL 2252 and are continuously working with nationally recognized labs to ensure safety. You're right that there are a ton of uncertified adapters on Amazon.
00:14:43
Speaker
That's the nature of Amazon. I know for a fact that the Society of Automotive Engineers is working on introducing legislation to ensure that aftermarket products, when they're listed on Amazon or bigger retailers, have to have a minimum amount of certification.
00:15:03
Speaker
Regulations move slowly, so it's hard for me to say whether this will come into effect in three months, six months, nine months, 12 months, or even longer than that. But we've seen this movie before with, for example, jump starters. If you now want to sell a jump starter on Amazon, you need to have a UL certificate.
00:15:23
Speaker
And the same is going to happen in the EV charging category for chargers, adapters, and charging stations. It's just a matter of time. When we're looking at what has changed with Camdeo moving away and Nax taking over and already in a short period of time a lot changes in the industry, especially with your products and the
00:15:46
Speaker
all the different ones that you manufacture, what do you think is going to happen? What are you placing bets on for the next, let's say, three to five years? Inductive charging, where are you seeing the industry go for aftermarket charging in the EV space? On the inductive charging side, I'm a little hesitant to embrace that, largely because of the energy loss you experienced during inductive charging.
00:16:16
Speaker
The fact that the problem that inductive charging is solving is not a huge one. I mean, plugging in your charging cup is not, you know, it's not the end of the world. The increased infrastructure cost. Everybody's already complaining about how difficult it is to implement normally recharging infrastructure. And now you have to implement another layer of infrastructure on top of that. Both on the vehicle side, you need an inductive charging call on the vehicle side and on the, on the infrastructure side.
00:16:46
Speaker
So given all of these things together, I have a hard time seeing which car manufacturer would deliberately push up the bill of materials of their own vehicles to put an inductive charging coil in there, become less price competitive for a standard that doesn't exist, for a problem that isn't a huge one.
00:17:11
Speaker
So I am somewhat, I am biased, but I'm somewhat skeptical about this. I see the argument that for fully autonomous driving, this may very well make sense, but how many years we're away from that. I can't, this is above my pay grade. I can't speak to them. Generally speaking, what holds true for us is that customers will always want better products at lower prices.
00:17:37
Speaker
And this largely informs our product roadmap. So that's the one thing I can predict is nobody's going to call us in five years and says, electron, I wish your chargers cost 300 bucks more. No, they're always going to be like, we want better stuff, safer stuff, and at more competitive prices. And that's how we think about our product roadmap going forward.
00:18:01
Speaker
Like we've hit on a little bit prior, Chris, we've talked about how our podcast, we were really trying to tailor towards that new EV buyer. The person may have just got their EV, maybe they're going to get in six months and they're trying to work through all the things that they need. With the products Electron offers, what sort of items is that new EV owner going to be able to get from Electron to help make that transition easier for them? In all of you.
00:18:28
Speaker
In order to have a seamless EV charging experience, we recommend that customers order three product categories. Number one is a powerful in-home charging solution. So there I would refer you to our 48 amp V-box, 11.5 kilowatt, which provides more than enough power for overnight charging, given that most people's commute or daily commute is no more than 50, 80 miles.
00:18:57
Speaker
that's plenty of juice. So that's the first part of the equation. The second part of the equation would be a versatile portable charging solution that customers can keep on their vehicle. This could be a level one or a dual level one and level two portable charger that they can keep on their car while traveling. And the third component of that equation are adapters.
00:19:24
Speaker
So there's obviously the dichotomy of charging standards between Tesla and non-Tesla and then between AC and DC. In this case, we recommend that customers buy at least one or two adapters to ensure that their vehicles are compatible with other charging standards. So for example, if you're a Tesla owner, you probably want to have a CCS to NEX and J1772 to NEX adapter to make sure that you can take advantage of the expansive
00:19:53
Speaker
J1772 and CCS infrastructure in the US. If you're a non-Tesla owner, at least as of now, we recommend that you get our best-selling Tesla to J1772 and our newly lodged Tesla to CCS1 adapter.
00:20:09
Speaker
And these little adapters are essentially a small insurance policy, a small price to pay to have the ability to charge wherever you are, regardless of the infrastructure nearby. I know personally, because I've got a Ford Mach-E and I'm waiting on Ford to get me the adapter.
Production and Shipping of Electron Adapters
00:20:25
Speaker
I know Mike's waiting on his Rivian one as well. How quickly would people expect to be able to see the CCS to NEX adapter coming from Octron? It's currently shipping.
00:20:37
Speaker
So it's currently being shipped. We're working through the back orders. We're ramping up production. Um, and I think we're going to have worked through the back orders in the next two or three weeks. And then, uh, waiting times will be, you know, like any other product, uh, that ships from us and will, will generally leave the warehouse within.
00:20:58
Speaker
to five days. Chris, it's been great talking with you and we're really excited to see the good things that are becoming from electron here into the future and getting our hands on that the next adapter and we appreciate your time. Wonderful. Thank you. Thanks for us. Thank you for listening to plug in for more. Make sure you subscribe so you don't miss any future episodes. In the meantime, check out the one-stop EV Marketplace EV universe dot com. Until next time.