Volvo Cars Partners With & Invests in UK's Breathe for Next Generation Fast Charging

Volvo Cars has partnered up with the UK's Breathe Battery Technologies (Breathe), becoming the first car company to get access to the latest version of its patented, algorithm-enabled charging software. Volvo Cars will integrate Breathe’s software in its battery management platform to improve the performance of its charging technology.

The company will implement the new technology in its new generation fully electric cars, where it expects it will reduce the time it takes to charge your fully electric Volvo from 10 to 80 per cent charging state by as much as 30 per cent.

The charging time improvements will last across the full battery life cycle without impacting its health status.

The collaboration with Breathe is the result of a sourcing agreement for its flagship product, Breathe Charge, and represents the latest investment by the Volvo Cars Tech Fund, its corporate venture capital arm.

Breathe's embedded software products, Breathe Charge and Breathe Life, use adaptive charging to dynamically adjust the charging current across both the state of charge and state health windows, indicating the ideal current at every moment. 

Ann-Sofie Ekberg, CEO of the Volvo Cars Tech Fund, says: “The investment and commercial partnership with Breathe helps us address a familiar pain point for electric car customers and makes our charging performance even more competitive. Faster charging times, in the range where customers typically fast charge, represent a major step in the right direction as we continue to boost electric mobility and make it available to more people.”

“We’re very pleased with this investment and sourcing agreement with Volvo Cars and support their exciting journey towards full electrification,” adds Dr Ian Campbell, CEO of Breathe Battery Technologies. “Deploying our technology at scale on Volvo’s next generation EV platform opens doors to innovative car designs and performance improvements. We share a profound passion for electric mobility, and convenient, fast charging is one of the cornerstone enablers for the future we strive towards.”

The Volvo Cars Tech Fund was established in 2018 to invest in companies and technology areas that transform the automotive industry, such as electrification, AI, autonomous driving, sustainability, and digital commerce.