Eli5: since electric engines have a lot fewer moving parts, why does it take car manufacturers much longer to develop new electric cars?

Question

Eli5: since electric engines have a lot fewer moving parts, why does it take car manufacturers much longer to develop new electric cars?

In: 7

Answer 1

While the cars are simpler in the mechanical sense, it requires significantly more advanced technology to design and engineer. Hard Drives in computers are a nightmare of moving parts, but they came long before solid state storage for the same reason. I like the saying that the machine to build the machine is a lot more complex.

Shifting an industry to something new takes time, but once it’s fired up, you’ll see electric car models released with more frequency and with more margin, which means prices will come down even further.