The future of battery swapping technology in general is far from clear, but it seems to be well suited to the needs of electric scooters. Fujitsu and venture start-up RESC Ltd. have announced that they will collaborate in developing a system that uses Fujitsu’s cloud service to manage the cassette-type secondary batteries used in RESC’s electric scooters and the lockers that recharge them.

Fujitsu’s location-based SPATIOWL system will make it possible to monitor traffic conditions and vehicle statistics, as well as information on when the scooter batteries need to be charged, when they need to be replaced, and the locations of replacement batteries and charging lockers.

Using the system, scooter riders can connect their smartphones to the batteries via Bluetooth and use an app to monitor the remaining charge on a battery and its remaining useful life. Battery data is sent to a central server, which will predict when a battery needs to be replaced and automate the management and use of deteriorated batteries.

Riders can look up the charging status of individual batteries, predict the distance a battery will be able to run, and search for and reserve battery replacement locations.

RESC plans to run verification tests within the year, to roll out electric scooters with these batteries to delivery companies by 2015, and to make the system available to the general public by 2020.

Source: Fujitsu, RESC