Sharing Economy

Frugal Innovation Recipes – Part 3

~ Venkata Gandikota

Shivkumar Kalyanaraman, who is Program Director, Special Initiatives, IBM Research – India has written an excellent article on how to realise the rapid adoption of Electric Vehicles in India.

He has a highly informative article on ownership vs sharing and how circular economy (products as a service) can play a role in markets like India.

In his article titled “Understanding Shared EV Transportation for India: Electric Cabs vs Electric Buses (& RBT) and Metro Rail” he has this to say:
Conventional wisdom is that electric vehicles are VERY VERY costly for India… Or are they really? How quickly can we see meaningful penetration in India? To first approximation solar was expensive in 2009, but has achieved grid parity now, similarly energy storage and EVs are expensive now, but will be where solar is today by 2020 (i.e. 4-5 year lag w.r.t solar).

Shivkumar goes on to list that since the Indian government has stated that they want to have an aggressive policy of 2030 as a deadline year to have All-Electric Vehicle sales in the automotive space. He talks about how to achieve this via three major areas:
– EVs as Electric Cabs
– Electric Buses and Rapid Bus Transit (RBT)
– (Electric) Metro Transport Systems

The key contributor to the EV affordability case is the dropping price of LiIon batteries, the major cost component of EVs. The recent BNEF forecast indicates a EV learning rate of 20-25% to continue through 2030.

Wharton Knowledge – The Sharing Economy’s Success Lies On Creating Accessible & Affordable Solutions

~ Venkata Gandikota

In an article from December 2015 on Wharton Knowledge – The Sharing Economy: A New Way of Doing Business, there are really good insights into the motivation to create sharing solutions and the success of such solutions.

Source: Venture Beat
Source: Venture Beat

At least until recently, car buyers haven’t worried about the excess capacity they were purchasing, as long as the lifetime value of the vehicle was greater for them than its lifetime cost.
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“In the collaborative economy it’s not the idea of sharing that’s new… What’s different now is the introduction of technology into the concept.” — H.O. Maycotte, Umbel

All this excess capacity is what makes the sharing economy possible.
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“Consumers simply want to make savvy purchases, and access economy companies allow them to achieve this, by offering more convenience at lower price.” — Giana M. Eckhardt and Fleura Bardhi, researchers