Electric car venture gains momentum

NETANYA, Israel — Project Better Place, the Israeli venture focusing on electric cars, has named three more partners for its planned project of an electric recharge grid network infrastructure for electric vehicles.

Strategic design firm NewDealDesign (San Francisco, Calif.) will develop the industrial design for the charging stations and other consumer touch points for the grid; Aran Research and Development Ltd. (Caesarea, Israel) and Nekuda DM Ltd. (Tel Aviv, Israel) will develop and install the electric vehicle recharging stations in Israel.

The startup also named Moshe Kaplinsky to head its operations in Israel, which was established as its primary research and development center to help develop the technology for mass deployment of electric vehicles.

Before joining Better Place Israel, Kaplinsky most recently served as deputy chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). He will report to Shai Agassi, founder and CEO of Project Better Place.

In January, Better Place announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Renault-Nissan to build the Electric Recharge Grid Operator (ERGO) model for clean transportation in Israel. Under the agreement, Better Place will build the electric recharge grid, and Renault-Nissan will provide the electric vehicles.

Next year, Better Place expects to deploy hundreds of charging stations as the company moves toward wide-scale deployment in 2011.