Ample Brings Modular Battery Swapping Technology to Madrid with Support from the Spanish Government and the Moves Singulares Award

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Ample Brings Modular Battery Swapping Technology to Madrid with Support from the Spanish Government and the Moves Singulares Award

2025-06-10 15:01 Last Updated At：15:21

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 10, 2025--

Ample, a leading provider of battery swapping technology for electric vehicles, has completed the deployment of its first modular battery swapping stations in Madrid. This deployment was made possible with Ample’s receipt of the Moves Singulares award, an initiative by the Government of Spain to fund innovative technologies to accelerate the transition to electric mobility. With the support of €9.76 million, Ample has planned the installation of several additional modular EV battery swapping stations in Madrid’s city center. This marks the beginning of a broader rollout of Ample’s technology across the city, aimed at tackling key barriers to EV adoption, including charging time, range anxiety, and infrastructure scalability.

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Madrid leads Spain in electric vehicle adoption, with the highest number of EV registrations in the country. To meet its goal of reducing emissions by 65% by 2030 and align with Spain’s national target of 5.5 million EVs on the road within the decade, the city is rapidly expanding charging infrastructure and exploring solutions like battery swapping.

Recognizing the role of modular battery swapping in accelerating EV adoption, the Spanish government selected Ample as the first recipient of the Moves Singulares award for this technology. Ample was chosen for its ability to address urban charging constraints, support high-utilization fleets, and reduce vehicle emissions in densely populated areas.

Ample’s battery swapping technology fully charges electric vehicles in five minutes, making it as fast and convenient as refueling with gas. The system is designed for seamless integration with any EV model, replacing depleted batteries with fully charged ones. Its modular architecture allows for rapid deployment—stations can be installed in as little as three days—making it an ideal solution for urban environments like Madrid.

“This grant is a tremendous step forward for Ample and the electric mobility space in Spain. By partnering with the Spanish government, we are not just meeting the immediate infrastructure needs of Madrid’s growing population, but also laying the groundwork for a future-proof, sustainable urban mobility ecosystem,” said Khaled Hassounah, CEO of Ample. “We look forward to working with our partners to get more Ample-powered vehicles on the roads.”

Ample is strengthening its partnership with Stellantis to roll out a swappable Fiat 500e car-sharing service in Madrid. This collaboration includes the Fiat brand, Free2move, Stellantis' mobility service operator, and Free2move Charge, Stellantis's customer-specific charging services.

Note: This action is part of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan – Funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU. However, the views and opinions expressed are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Commission. Neither the European Union nor the European Commission can be held responsible for them.

About Ample

Ample aims to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles and sustainable transportation energy globally. The company is pioneering a new method of energy delivery through modular battery swapping and can deliver a 100% charge to any EV in under 5 minutes. Founded in 2014, Ample is headquartered in San Francisco. Repsol Energy Ventures invested in Ample in 2018. For more information, please visit www.ample.com.

Hennepin County prosecutor calls on the public to share Renee Good shooting evidence with her office

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty on Friday called on members of the public to send any video or other evidence in the fatal shooting of Renee Good directly to her office, challenging the Trump administration's decision to leave the investigation solely to the FBI.

Moriarty said that although her office has collaborated effectively with the FBI in past cases, she is concerned by the Trump administration's decision to bar state and local agencies from playing any role in the investigation into Wednesday's killing of Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis.

She also said that despite the Trump administration’s insistence that the officer who shot Good has complete legal immunity, that isn’t the case.

“We do have jurisdiction to make this decision with what happened in this case,” she said at a news conference. “It does not matter that it was a federal law enforcement agent.”

Moriarty said her office would post a link for the public to submit footage of the shooting, even though she acknowledged that she wasn't sure what legal outcome submissions might produce.

The prosecutor's announcement came on a third day of Minneapolis protests over Good's killing and a day after federal immigration officers shot and wounded two people in Portland, Oregon.

Good's wife, Becca Good, released a statement to Minnesota Public Radio on Friday saying, “kindness radiated out of her.”

"On Wednesday, January 7th, we stopped to support our neighbors. We had whistles. They had guns," Becca Good said.

“I am now left to raise our son and to continue teaching him, as Renee believed, that there are people building a better world for him,” she wrote. “That the people who did this had fear and anger in their hearts, and we need to show them a better way.”

The reaction to the Good's shooting was immediate in the city where police killed George Floyd in 2020, with hundreds of protesters converging on the shooting scene and the school district canceling classes for the rest of the week as a precaution.

On Thursday night, hundreds marched in freezing rain down one of Minneapolis’ major thoroughfares, chanting “ICE out now!” and holding signs saying, “Killer ice off our streets." And on Friday, protesters were out again demonstrating outside of a federal facility that is serving as a hub for the immigration crackdown that began Tuesday in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Authorities erected barricades outside the facility Friday.

City workers, meanwhile, removed makeshift barricades made of old Christmas trees and other debris that had been blocking the streets near the scene of Good's shooting. Officials said they would leave up a shrine to the 37-year-old mother of three.

The Portland shootings happened outside a hospital Thursday afternoon. Federal immigration officers shot and wounded a man and woman, identified by the Department of Homeland Security as Venezuela nationals Luis David Nico Moncada and Yorlenys Betzabeth Zambrano-Contreras, who were inside a vehicle, and their conditions weren't immediately known. The FBI and the Oregon Department of Justice were investigating.

Portland Mayor Keith Wilson and the city council called on ICE to end all operations in the city until a full investigation is completed. Hundreds protested Thursday night at a local ICE building. Early Friday, Portland police reported that officers had arrested several protesters after asking the to get out of a street to allow traffic to flow.

Just as it did following Good's shooting, DHS defended the actions of the officers in Portland, saying it occurred after a Venezuelan man with alleged gang ties and who was involved in a recent shooting tried to “weaponize” his vehicle to hit the officers. It wasn't immediately clear if the shootings were captured on video, as Good's was.

The Minneapolis shooting happened on the second day of the immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities, which Homeland Security said is the biggest immigration enforcement operation ever. More than 2,000 officers are taking part and Noem said they have made more than 1,500 arrests.

The government is also shifting immigration officers to Minneapolis from sweeps in Louisiana, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press. This represents a pivot, as the Louisiana crackdown that began in December had been expected to last into February.

Good's death — at least the fifth tied to immigration sweeps since Trump took office — has resonated far beyond Minneapolis, as protests happening in other places, including Texas, California, Detroit and Missouri.

In Washington, D.C., on Thursday, a woman held a sign that said, “Stop Trump’s Gestapo,” as hundreds of people marched to the White House. Protesters in Pflugerville, Texas, north of Austin, banged on the walls of an ICE facility. And a man in Los Angeles burned an American flag in front of federal detention center.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, President Donald Trump and others in his administration have repeatedly characterized the Minneapolis shooting as an act of self-defense and cast Good as a villain, suggesting she used her vehicle as a weapon to attack the officer who shot her.

But state and local officials and protesters rejected that characterization, with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey saying videos show the self-defense argument is “garbage.”

Several bystanders captured footage of Good's killing, which happened in a neighborhood south of downtown.

The recordings show an officer approaching an SUV stopped across the middle of the road, demanding the driver open the door and grabbing the handle. The Honda Pilot begins to pull forward and a different ICE officer standing in front of it pulls his weapon and immediately fires at least two shots at close range, jumping back as the vehicle moves toward him.

It is not clear from the videos if the vehicle makes contact with the officer, and there is no indication of whether the woman had interactions with agents earlier. After the shooting, the SUV speeds into two cars parked on a curb before crashing to a stop.

The federal agent who fatally shot Good is an Iraq War veteran who has served for nearly two decades in the Border Patrol and ICE, according to records obtained by AP.

Noem has not publicly named him, but a Homeland Security spokesperson said her description of his injuries last summer refers to an incident in Bloomington, Minnesota, in which court documents identify him as Jonathan Ross.

Ross got his arm stuck in the window of a vehicle whose driver was fleeing arrest on an immigration violation. Ross was dragged and fired his Taser. A jury found the driver guilty of assaulting a federal officer with a dangerous weapon.

Attempts to reach Ross, 43, at phone numbers and email addresses associated with him were not successful.

Associated Press reporters Steve Karnowski and Mark Vancleave in Minneapolis; Ed White in Detroit; Valerie Gonzalez in Brownsville, Texas; Graham Lee Brewer in Norman, Oklahoma; Michael Biesecker in Washington; Jim Mustian and Safiyah Riddle in New York; Ryan Foley in Iowa City, Iowa; and Hallie Golden in Seattle contributed to this report.