Can innovative business models overcome resistance to electric vehicles? Better Place and battery electric cars in Denmark Thomas Budde Christensen a,n , Peter Wells b , Liana Cipcigan c a Roskilde University, Universitetsvej 1, 4000 Roskilde, Denmark b Cardiff Business School, CF10 3EU, UK c Cardiff School of Engineering, CF10, UK HIGHLIGHTS c We explore the context for an innovative emergent business model to deliver battery electric car mobility in Denmark. c We explore the interplay between battery electric cars, renewable energy generation and smart grids. c We discuss the integration of electric cars in energy systems based on renewable energy sources. c We discuss the likely success of the Better Place business model. article info Article history: Received 20 February 2012 Accepted 22 May 2012 Available online 30 June 2012 Keywords: Business models Electric cars Better Place abstract This paper explores the geographical and policy context for an emergent business model from Better Place to deliver battery electric car mobility in Denmark. It argues that the combination of radically different technologies and a highly complex multi-agency operating environment theoretically provide the conditions and requirements for such an emergent business model. While focused on battery electric cars, renewable energy generation and smart grids, the paper has wider applicability to an understanding of the interplay between place, innovation and sustainability which suggests that diverse solutions are likely to be the characteristic solution rather than ubiquity and standardization. The paper argues, however, that the innovative business model, the deployment of electric vehicles, and the use of renewable energy systems, in this case largely based on wind power, while mutually supportive and contributing to wider policy aims with respect to the reduction of carbon emissions, may still fail in the face of entrenched practices. At the theoretical level it is concluded that theorization of business models needs a broader perspective beyond the typical ‘value creation, value capture’ rubric to better understand the wider role such models have in meeting societal goals, and to understand the structural impediments to organizational and technical innovation. & 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Research into innovative business models has highlighted the ways in which competitive advantage may be secured by creating new businesses premised on novel structures and approaches, or by re-engineering the architecture of existing businesses. In broad terms, the two primary conditions to allow or promote business model innovation are technological innovations (in the product/ service offered or in the underlying business processes) or economic distress under which existing business models are losing their competitive power. Research in this area tends to focus on the innovative cases and on the success stories. In contrast, the ability of entrenched business models or other forces for inertia to resist change tends to be neglected. As this paper argues, the instance of electric vehicles would appear to offer theoretically good reasons to expect that profound technological changes in the nature of the product, allied to repeated economic distress evident in the existing dominant business model for vehicle manufacturing, would yield the perfect opportunity for business model innovation to flourish. Indeed, such innovations in business organization have been claimed to be a pre-requisite for the successful electrification of automobility (Berger, 2011; Wells, 2010a). According to the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) global emissions of CO 2 must be reduced by 50%–85% by 2050 in order to avoid global warming exceeding the 2 1C threshold Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol Energy Policy 0301-4215/$ - see front matter & 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2012.05.054 n Corresponding author. Tel.: þ45 46 74 26 37. E-mail addresses: tbc@ruc.dk (T. Budde Christensen), wellspe@cardiff.ac.uk (P. Wells), CipciganLM@cardiff.ac.uk (L. Cipcigan). Energy Policy 48 (2012) 498–505