How about a new, fully electric Volvo car that can go just that little bit further with less charging time? The upcoming Volvo ES90 does exactly that, thanks to our new 800V technology which makes its debut in our latest fully electric model.
The benefits of an 800-volt electric system are numerous: your battery gets charged faster, your electric car gets an improved overall performance, and the electric system is more efficient compared to a 400-volt system.
Combine this with completely new battery management software and hardware as well as a progressive design, and you get a car that goes further and charges faster than any electric Volvo before. The ES90 can add 300 kilometres of range in just 10 minutes at 350 kW fast charging stations and offers a driving range of up to 700 kilometres under the WLTP testing cycle.
The ES90 is designed to be a premium Volvo car that gives you quality time with the people you love, providing you with peace of mind and balance, as well as a sense of convenience and control. A state-of-the-art electric system that enables faster charging and longer range is key to achieving that ambition. No matter where or how far your trip goes, the ES90 is designed to get you there reliably and comfortably.
“Our 800V technology marks another significant technological upgrade for our customers as we move towards full electrification,” says Anders Bell, our chief engineering and technology officer. “It makes our electric cars even more efficient, helps you charge your electric Volvo faster and go further on a single charge.”
800-volt gives you more of everything
To create our new 800-volt system, every component in the electric system has been upgraded to be compatible with 800-volt, including the battery cells, e-motors, inverter, charging as well as climate and thermal systems. That creates benefits in terms of charging, efficiency and performance.
A higher voltage system means that it can deliver more power (in kilowatts, or kW) and range with the same current as a 400-volt system. This approach generates less heat, meaning your battery can be charged faster up to 350kW without overloading the electric system.
Our 800-volt system also contains lighter e-motors and other components, which reduces the car’s overall weight. This also improves the system’s efficiency, while boosting the car’s acceleration and driving range.
The brand new in-house developed battery management software creates a more robust charging experience. Compared to other electric Volvo cars, our new software cuts the time it takes to charge your ES90 from 10 to 80 per cent by as much as 30 per cent, down to 20 minutes. This is partly thanks to the integration of adaptive charging software from Breathe Battery Technologies, a company we invested in last year via the Volvo Cars Tech Fund, our corporate venture capital arm.
Sustainability in focus
However, battery technology is not the only area in which the ES90 is a star performer. It also helps us make progress in other sustainability-related areas. For example, the ES90 is packed with recycled and natural materials that contribute to lower CO2 emissions in production. 29 per cent of all aluminium and 18 per cent of all steel used in the ES90 is recycled, while the ES90 also contains 16 per cent recycled polymers and bio-based materials. The wood panels inside the ES90 are made from FSC-certified wood.
The ES90 also comes with our battery passport. Based on blockchain technology that allows us to track raw materials. The passport tells you where the lithium, cobalt, nickel and graphite used in the battery originate from. It also highlights the CO2 footprint of the full battery pack and other relevant information. For customers, this provides transparency about how we source raw battery material in a responsible way.
Volvo’s Most Advanced In-Car Computing System Yet
The ES90 is the first Volvo car to be equipped with a dual NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Orin configuration, making it the most powerful car we have ever created in terms of core computing capacity. This allows us to further raise the bar on safety and overall performance through data, software and AI.
DRIVE AGX Orin is NVIDIA’s core computer for intelligent cars that orchestrates various essential systems and processes inside the car at ultra-fast speeds. With a high level of computational power – around 508 trillion operations per second (also known as TOPS) – it manages functionalities such as AI-based, state-of-the-art active safety features, car sensors and efficient battery management.
The NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Orin-powered primary core computer provides an eightfold improvement in AI compute performance compared with DRIVE AGX Xavier, enabling us to gradually increase the size of our deep learning model and neural network from 40 million to 200 million parameters. This will happen over time as we collect more data and continue to develop the model, with the overall goal of improving customer experience and – most importantly – safety levels.
A truly software-defined car designed to improve with time
The ES90 is built on our SPA2 architecture and is the second car based on the Volvo Cars Superset tech stack, following the EX90. The Superset tech stack consists of one single set of hardware and software modules and systems that underpin all our upcoming electric cars.
It represents a radical transformation in how we can develop and use software to improve our levels of safety, technology and overall performance throughout the car’s lifecycle. With the Superset tech stack, we can make such improvements more efficiently and roll them out even faster via over-the-air updates and across all models based on the Superset.
Such updates might include new connectivity features, safety improvements and other enhancements that can elevate the performance of the car, such as a better battery range for your car for certain driving behaviours. Continuous improvement via regular over-the-air updates now comes as standard on your Volvo car.
And as the Superset tech stack underpins all our upcoming electric cars, we can boost the performance of each car in our lineup simultaneously, so that ES90 customers benefit from EX90 software upgrades and vice versa. That means software now replaces hardware as the primary driver of innovation and value creation for our customers.
“The Volvo ES90 is one of the most technically advanced cars on the market today and is designed to be improved further with time,” added Bell. “Built on our state-of-the-art Superset tech stack, the ES90 puts safety at the forefront.”
Safe Space Technology designed to protect and care for you
The ES90 combines an exceptional understanding of its surroundings through an advanced array of sensors, which includes one lidar, five radars, seven cameras and twelve ultrasonic sensors, as well as an advanced driver understanding system inside the car. These safety systems are designed to help keep you safe by detecting obstacles, even in darkness, and activating proactive safety measures, such as collision avoidance.
It’s what we call our Safe Space Technology – everything we put in a car is meant to build a safe space for everyone in and around the car, and technology helps us make that happen. Our Safe Space Technology is designed to help avoid accidents and hazards on the road, with the aim of making your everyday journey safer and more enjoyable.
“We innovate in all areas of technology to become a leader in software-defined cars, and we’re channelling all our engineering efforts into one direction: making great cars that get even better over time. By combining the power of core computing and our Superset tech stack, we can now make safer cars more efficiently than ever before,” concluded Bell.
For ES90 customers, all this translates into a premium Volvo car that is designed to keep you safe and give you quality time with the people you love. We have designed cars that place people first for nearly 100 years. We always use technology with purpose, equipping our cars with the right amount of tech to ensure a comfortable and safe ride. As such, the ES90 is designed to provide you with the mental peace and balance we all need in our hectic lives.
Future implementation for existing customers
The dual NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Orin configuration will also be implemented on EX90 cars, upgrading its current version which includes DRIVE AGX Orin and DRIVE AGX Xavier, in line with our philosophy of continuous improvement.
This is a tangible example of how our Superset tech stack approach allows us to upgrade the hardware of our cars as new technologies become available. Existing customers of the EX90 will get an upgrade of their cars free of charge.
The ES90 will be revealed to the world on March 5. Follow the livestream via es90event.volvocars.com
The small print
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The WLTP driving range of up to 700km translates to 740 km under the CLTC driving cycle in China and applies to the all-wheel drive variants with twin motor and 106 kWh battery.
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Charging times can vary and depend on various factors such as outdoor temperature, battery condition and car condition. Our charging time was based on testing at 350 kW charging facilities.
