UK battery repair and remanufacturing specialist Autocraft Solutions Group has been awarded the newly-created Green Award at Automechanika Frankfurt.
The company received the award for its proprietary REVIVE solution, which diagnoses, repairs and remanufactures failed electric vehicle (EV) battery packs at scale. REVIVE’s aim is to keep functional cells and modules in service, rather than sending battery packs for premature recycling.
With the first mass-market wave of end-of-life EVs starting to hit the aftermarket, there is increasing focus on how the industry handles ageing battery packs. Over the next four to five years, this volume is expected to accelerate significantly.
“We must wake up to the reality that a replace-and-recycle approach is unsustainable,” said Mike Hague-Morgan, executive director and co-owner of Autocraft Solutions Group. “As the EV parc expands, so too will the number of battery failures, especially as packs age and degrade over time.
“Yet most batteries can be restored to optimal health, making repair the only logical way forward. The Automechanika Green Award confirms that argument is now being accepted across the industry.”
Until now, batteries that fail in service have typically been replaced outright and sent for recycling, regardless of the issue or fault. Autocraft says that the majority of failures are localised at cell or module level, and that packs can be restored to more than 90% of their original performance by replacing only the affected components.
Across Autocraft’s Grantham and Arnhem workshops, between 300 and 400 battery packs a month are being repaired for OEM customers. Figures from the RECOVAS consortium – a UK Government-backed collaboration between vehicle manufacturers, recyclers and academic partners – show that repairing an 82.5kWh pack rather than replacing it avoids around 12 tonnes of CO₂.
Autocraft’s REVIVE EV battery service covers triage and fixed workshop remanufacture and full vehicle collection and return. Battery health is assessed and faults diagnosed at cellular level through the company’s OptEVizer testing platform which goes beyond the battery management system (BMS) to actively stress the battery.
The data captured is then analysed using the OptEVizer digital twin which contains thousands of real-world test cycles and millions of individual data points to find cell weaknesses and a true, independent State of Health.
Building on its existing UK and Netherlands operations, the company is keen to expand further into key European countries including Germany, Spain, and Italy, reflecting where OEM demand for battery repair capacity is expected to be concentrated.
“The next challenge is design,” continued Hague-Morgan. “Manufacturers and legislators must work together to ensure future battery designs allow for effective repair, rather than making repair more difficult through increasingly complex architectures.
“If we do not act now, we risk locking in a throwaway model at exactly the point the volume is about to arrive. Our commitment to expanding remanufacturing capability across Europe reflects that reality.”
