Kit Wisdom, mobility solutions manager at Alphabet, said there are five key hurdles to overcome in the move to using an EV as your company car.
“There’s suitability – will it fit your business mobility requirements? There’s charging facilities either at home or at the office. Then there’s the cost – is it worth it? Finally, there’s overcoming range anxiety and access to public charging.
“If we find that some or all of your company cars are suitable for a switch to electric, then AlphaElectric, with its mobility packs, provides the rest of the in-life support you will need.”
Alphabet carried out a case study on nine cars run by the public services provider Amey during the development stage of AlphaElectric. It found that one car could be 100% electric; five could potentially use electric or plug-in hybrid; and three weren’t suitable.
“If Amey accepted our analysis,” said Kit, “there would be a 13% reduction in costs and a 60% reduction in CO2 emission levels. But as we can see from our analysis of Amey, electric isn’t right for everyone.”
Among the AlphaElectric suite of products are free downloadable apps for the driver and for the business car manager or SME director responsible for the company car fleet.
These tools, said Paul Hollick, Alphabet’s chief commercial officer, provide the initial phase of the switch to electric where SMEs could engage in their own analysis, before verification with the AlphaElectric consultancy service team.
“For SMEs, the key items in terms of adopting EVs are the Discovery and Comfort packs,” continued Paul.
“One is a try before you buy product and the second provides budgetary certainty if you need to terminate the business car lease early.
“And we think now is absolutely the right time to launch the AlphaElectric consultancy service. That’s because premium car makers are entering the market – BMW with its i3 and Audi next year with its e-tron model.
“EVs are not now seen as a fad. BMW and Audi have given the EV market gravitas, which it lacked before.
“Our AlphaElectric consultancy service provides company car managers with a full range of answers to take to a company’s board and make the case for change.”
Read our blog Alphabet aims to sell 500 electric cars in 2014
