LONDON — Former Aston Martin CEO Andy Palmer has joined Brill Energy as chairman to assist the British battery sensor maker construct its enterprise with main automakers and the power storage business, the corporate mentioned.

Brill Energy is a spin-out from Oxford College and has developed sensors that may monitor and handle particular person cells in electric-vehicle battery packs.

This overcomes a core drawback for EVs, the place efficiency is decided by the weakest cell in any battery pack and might lengthen a battery pack’s vary and life by 60 %, Palmer mentioned.

The know-how can be used to find out a used EV battery’s well being and permit potential patrons to guage how lengthy the car may realistically final, Palmer instructed Reuters.

Brill Energy’s know-how is at present in exams in a single upcoming EV that might be on the street in two years and the corporate is speaking to numerous automakers a couple of vary of inexpensive EVs and high-performance fashions.

“The aim right here is principally to take this group of very sensible people and provides them somewhat little bit of steering within the industrial world,” Palmer mentioned of his new function at Brill Energy, which raised $10.5 million final yr to scale up its operations.

Palmer, who oversaw the launch of the Leaf EV over a decade in the past whereas chief working officer at Nissan, can be at present interim CEO at British EV charger firm Pod Level and chairman of Slovak battery startup Inobat.