HERE & Hyundai: making range anxiety a thing of the past

Hyundai, the world's fourth-largest seller of electric cars, plans to accelerate the switch to electric with a new real-time simulator that makes journey planning easier.

The fear of running out of power in an electric vehicle before reaching a charging point is still a major barrier to entry for many prospective electric vehicle drivers.

A recent Harris poll for a major carmaker found that this was still a chief concern for 58% of those surveyed. However, Hyundai might just have developed the perfect solution to cure your EV range anxiety and in turn, help ease the transition to electric.

Together with BeNomad, a software company that develops better mobility solutions, Hyundai has launched an EV simulator on its French website. Incorporating location technology from HERE, the simulator will help electric car drivers plan the best route using dynamic, real-time, and precise information about charging point availability and recharging time.

Clémentine Antunes, head of brand, strategy and communication at Hyundai France, calls this simulator “a game-changer in electric mobility”. She adds: “Mobility has changed a lot and consumers can be anxious with an EV car because it's not so easy to charge your car everywhere. If people want to buy a new EV car, they have to change their mindset and the way they think about mobility.

Clémentine Antunes, head of brand, strategy and communication at Hyundai France. Image credit: Hyundai Motor France.

“This trip simulator will be like a best friend for the new EV consumer to be able to plan their trips and charge their Hyundai on the move. It's in real-time so you can see if a charging solution is available or not, or out of order, as well as find out information like how much it costs, and how long they have to wait. It's a way to plan and anticipate your future trip with a new EV car.”

In charge of your EV

In comparison to a petrol or diesel car, where you can pull over and within five minutes receive several hundred kilometers of range, in an electric car the process is slower and you get less energy.

“Instead of being anxious about the range, you'll be anxious about where to charge and how long you will spend at the next charging point,” says Stéfane Maynard, CEO of BeNomad. “And that's the reason why we're creating this service, to allow people to calculate a trip and give information about the charging time for each stop you have to make.”

“Where are the charging points and what's the power that's provided? Based on that, you know if you're compatible with that point and how long you have to spend there. But this is static information,” adds Stéfane. “You don't know if that charging point will be available. That's the reason we've integrated dynamic services from HERE, to give people precise information about availability and status. Based on that, you can build that into your route calculations to propose another charging point if the one you selected isn't available.”

Buyers of cars like the Hyundai Kona Electric will be able to plan their trips with greater precision. Image credit: Hyundai Motor France.

But the range simulator goes beyond a calculation of distance or time to the next charging point. It uses real-time weather and traffic information to give more accurate and constantly-dynamic data about your trip. “Real-time traffic information is important because that is going to change the speed of the road that you're going to take,” explains Stéfane. “And there's a direct link between the speed you can drive and the consumption of energy. This information from HERE allows us to be more precise in our route calculations.”

The HERE-powered BeNomad simulator on the Hyundai France website is a game-changer that will make trip planning in an EV easier.

Many governments are accelerating the switch to EV, yet the adoption of electric vehicles remains faster than the rate at which compatible charging stations are being built. Technology like this therefore becomes a vital step in route planning – and it's something that Clémentine believes will make it into cars soon. “A trip simulator on the website is the first step,” she says, “but in the near future every connected car would probably include this kind of simulator.”

Find an EV charging point with HERE.