BatteryPool Highlights Safer Battery Control Architecture Amid BMS Security Concerns in E-Rickshaws

PRNewswire
Pune (Maharashtra) [India], July 14: BatteryPool, an Indian deeptech-fintech startup revolutionising EV adoption in India, has proactively designed its battery-control architecture to ensure that batteries can only be controlled at the charging point and never while the vehicle is on the road, making mid-ride shutdowns impossible.
BatteryPool highlights this feature in response to recent incidents of unauthorized Bluetooth access to e-rickshaw batteries, which enables individuals to cut power mid-route remotely. These incidents have raised serious concerns about the security of connected batteries in India's EV ecosystem. Following their occurrence, India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) ordered the removal of three apps (BAT-BMS, Epoch Li-ion, and Lossigy) from app stores. Amidst these BMS-related incidents, e-rickshaw drivers were left stranded in traffic with passengers onboard, losing an estimated ₹400-500 in daily earnings for the day.
BatteryPool's design directly addresses one of the most pressing concerns emerging from these incidents: remote access must never result in unsafe on-road events.
The company's control layer is built on encrypted firmware embedded within the hardware, running on both the BMS and the charger. The two communicate exclusively through an encrypted handshake over the CAN (Controller Area Network) bus. Battery-level commands are not accessible via open Bluetooth channels or unsecured public app interfaces. Instead, access is strictly limited to authorized internal systems, designated personnel, and the BMS itself, leaving no wireless surface for an outside device to find or pair with, precisely the vulnerability the recent incidents exploited.
To further strengthen safety and reliability, BatteryPool batteries are configured to operate exclusively with authorized charging infrastructure. This approach minimizes risks associated with incompatible charging, improves battery health management, and ensures that assets remain within a secure and monitored ecosystem. Because BatteryPool controls the charging side, it controls charging behaviour on every battery, protecting battery health and extending battery life. Ninety percent of BatteryPool's batteries also run India-made BMS hardware, rather than imported systems.
Commenting on the issue, Ashwin Shankar, Founder of BatteryPool , said, "Connected batteries must be treated as digital assets. Recent BMS-related incidents underscore that battery security is now integral to battery safety. At BatteryPool, we made a deliberate design choice--control should occur during charging, not by interrupting discharge while a vehicle is in motion. This safeguards drivers, passengers, and the asset itself."
He added, "Our architecture is built to ensure that battery control remains secure, restricted, and anchored to the charging environment, rather than exposed through open or vulnerable access points. This handshake was built roughly 1.5 years ago, originally to enforce our sachet-style EMI payment model for drivers on a pay-per-use basis, without trust-based leakage. Solving that payment problem at the hardware-firmware level is what ended up solving a safety problem nobody had asked us to solve yet"
BatteryPool advocates for a shift from reactive fixes to a security-by-design approach. The company reports sub-1% NPAs in an industry that typically runs above 10%, and residual battery values of roughly 85% even years past standard OEM warranty periods.
As India accelerates its EV transition, building safer and more resilient battery systems will be foundational. For drivers, fleet operators, financiers, and passengers alike, batteries must remain secure, reliable, and safe throughout their lifecycle.
About BatteryPool
BatteryPool brings sachet-style, pay-as-you-earn payments to EV batteries for commercial 2W and 3W drivers. Through their proprietary tech stack, they control the battery asset to enforce repayment discipline and de-risk lending for partners. BatteryPool works with 15 fleet operators across 11 cities, partnering with NBFCs Finayo and AMU, along with battery OEMs Livguard and ipower, and vehicle OEMs Numeros, Jitendra, and Odyssey, to drive EV adoption at scale.
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