While electric cars will remain the largest electric vehicle market for the foreseeable future in terms of battery demand and market revenue generation, most transport sectors are facing a transition. In this article, IDTechEx summarizes key developments in non-automotive sectors, showing each sector's global battery demand (in 2021) for relative scale.

The development of wireless charging systems for electric vehicles (EVs) has slowly picked up momentum over the past decade. This charging solution relies on the principle of resonant inductive coupling to achieve wireless power transfer (WPT) from a ground-based pad to a vehicle-fitted pad. Drivers should simply align their vehicles with the ground pad for charging to begin automatically, eliminating the need to plug in.

The true description of graphene is that of a single atomic layer of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal array. However, the nanocarbon material landscape is much more complicated than this simple statement, with single-layer, few-layer, multi-layer, graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs) and both graphene oxide (GO) and reduced graphene oxide (rGO) all to be considered as types of graphene.

In 20 years, IDTechEx predicts electric cars will generate 76% of all e-transport revenues. Due to their scale, car markets create the largest opportunities for players in the electric vehicle supply chain, from advanced materials through to battery packs, power electronics, and electric motors.

Human-centric manufacturing puts a high requirement for safety in production because machines work closely with human operators.

Thursday 6 October 2022 - This webinar looks at some of the key achievements and milestones in the trucking industry. This is then compared to other heavy-duty autonomous vehicles and a complete holistic view of the industry is forged.

Is Graphene Green? This question comes up an increasing amount. Green drivers and ESG investments are an obvious focus across the supply chain, but where does graphene fit into this discussion? IDTechEx explore the answer in this article.

Due to the labor shortage and decreasing costs of hardware, using robots to serve people has gained significant momentum over the past decade, with Tesla unveiling their humanoid robot "Optimus" at the electric vehicle maker's "AI Day" event last week.

Thursday 13 October 2022 - The Key Driver for the New Industrial Transition? In this webinar, IDTechEx Technology Analyst Yulin Wang will talk about the critical enabling technologies used in collaborative robots, explain several key applications, and analyze how the market size will change in the next two decades.

With the innovation of lidar beam steering technologies, continuous lidar cost reduction, as well as the progress of Advanced Driving Assistance System (ADAS) and Autonomous vehicles (AV), lidars are embracing their potential US$8.4 billion-dollar market by 2033, enabled by automotive applications, which can be further widely expanded to other areas such as robotics, industrial, smart city, and mapping.

The sustainability of business operations is now a key consideration in the boardrooms of major corporations, and this is fuelling significant demand for zero-emission trucks. Transitioning truck fleets from diesel combustion engines to zero-emission powertrains is a very visible way for companies to demonstrate their green credentials to their customers whilst delivering a meaningful reduction in their carbon footprint.

Thursday 29 September 2022 - The webinar will cover 2022 H1 electric car sales; short term sales outlook and commentary; the latest EV policy by region; automaker and government EV targets; and powertrain trends which improve drive cycle efficiency

Following the release of the brand new IDTechEx report, "Collaborative Robots (Cobots) 2023-2043: Technologies, Players & Markets", Yulin Wang (Technology Analyst at IDTechEx) explores Industry 5.0 and the impact on the collaborative robot market.

As of mid-2022, the global graphene and graphene oxide installed capacity easily exceeds 12,000 tonnes per year, but utilization is low as the orders lag significantly behind. Is this a natural part of the commercial journey, or has hype overcome reality? Is this a case of "build it, they will come", or are there real market needs? What does the future hold for these graphene manufacturers? IDTechEx provides an independent perspective on these questions and more.

Thursday 8 September 2022 - 3D lidar market segment; Lidar for autonomous driving and ADAS; Technology analysis between TOF and FMCW; Technology analysis of different beam steering technologies such as mechanical lidar, MEMS, OPA, Flash and other solid-state lidars; Technology analysis of laser and receiver choices; Major players; Market outlook

IDTechEx believes that Europe will remain a charging dominant region with a focus on DC fast charging deployment, and the number of swapping stations will remain small.

The new IDTechEx report, "Heavy-Duty Autonomous Vehicles 2023-2043: Trucks, Buses & Roboshuttles", has found significant activity in the autonomous heavy-duty and commercial vehicle space.

The current iteration of Li-ion batteries, which are based on graphite anodes, liquid electrolytes, and cathode materials such as NMC and LFP, are generally considered to be reaching their performance limits. However, from cell materials to battery designs, there are still several routes that can lead to further improvements in performance and cost.

With increasing scrutiny of the environmental impact of current building practices, the electrification of mobile construction machinery offers construction companies a relatively near-term opportunity to demonstrate their environmental credentials.

While 2022 continues to add to the challenges electric vehicle (EV) makers face, markets are still growing. Indeed, electric car sales for the first half of 2022 reached ~3.5 million, according to IDTechEx research.