The transportation sector is considered to be one of the significant contributors of carbon emissions around the world. With the rise in carbon emissions, electric vehicles are increasingly becoming popular globally. Most of the developed countries are moving towards the electrification of the transportation sector at a faster pace. Although the concept of electrification is novel and environmentally friendly, the electricity demand is predicted to rise exponentially in the next decade. Concerning this demand, Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology is considered to be one of the best solutions by experts to incorporate future electricity demand. Even though the technology was introduced in the late 20th century, it is yet to be commercialized for public use on a large scale. There are various pilot projects under development around the world, especially in the European continent. A few private clients in Denmark have already commercialized the technology for private usage, but certainly, it is not available for the general public. Hence, Europe was considered to be an ideal choice for geographical focus. The most important barrier to the adoption of V2G technology is related to the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) in the market. While the demand for EVs is gradually increasing, the large scale adoption of V2G technology will eventually grow. The charging equipment that is used to charge the electric cars at the charging stations is another critical barrier. Three different standards are competing against each other to dominate the market (i.e., CHAdeMO, CCS Combo, and Tesla). Most of the charging stations in Europe consists of either or all the three types of charging equipment. A few private charging infrastructure companies have also established charging stations locally or nationally in Europe. As there is an equal distribution of CHAdeMO and CCS Combo charging stations around Europe, standardization of the charging equipment could become a necessity for the implementation of V2G technology in the future.
According to the literature, there are three different modes of standardization processes, namely: committee-based, market-based, and government-based standardization. Based on the involvement of various actors in the standardization processes, the concept of multi-mode standardization was introduced in the literature. The case of charging standards related to V2G technology involves actors from various domains indicating the potential case of multi-mode standardization. While the three charging standards are still in the early phases of the battle, it is imperative to analyze the factors that could influence the standardization of charging standards. Hence, the main research question for this research was framed: "What are the factors that influence the success of charging standards in the context of multi-mode standardization in the European market for the implementation of V2G technology?". The factors influencing success within the case of multi-mode standardization were recently introduced into the literature. A thorough literature review was carried out to identify a total of 39 influential factors within various case studies of multi-mode standardization. And it resulted in the proposition of a new framework for further analysis in this research. With the combination of a literature review and interview with the experts, 35 factors were found to be relevant. Further, a Multi-criteria Decision Making (MCDM) tool known as the ‘Best Worst Method (BWM)’ approach was used to rank the factors based on expert’s preferences. A total of seven interviews were conducted to allocate weights for each factor using the BWM approach to rank the factors. The experts belonged to academic as well as industrial backgrounds. The results of the analysis showed that the factors ‘brand reputation and credibility’, ‘compatibility’, ‘financial strength’, ‘bandwagon effect’, and ‘lobbying’ ended up being the top five influential factors in this research. While there were two groups of interviewees, a set of two different statistical tests were performed to analyze the significant differences between the results obtained from the two groups of experts. The weight of the factor ‘delay in the standardization process’ was found to be significantly different among the two groups. Hence, this factor was not considered for listing the influential factors.
Compared to the previous framework in the literature, a set of ten factors were added to the framework constructed during this research. The new factors were found to be indeed relevant in the standardization of charging standards. It was also observed for the first time in the BWM literature that a total of 35 factors were found to be relevant. Researchers can use the new framework for analyzing the factors influencing standards battle in different domains. Also, the BWM approach was used for the first time to identify success factors in the selection of charging standards for the implementation of V2G technology. Additionally, the articles that discussed success factors previously in literature from the market perspective were re-analyzed to explore the concept of multi-mode standardization for the first time. Out of ten reviewed articles, eight articles were recategorized to a relevant combination of multi-mode standardization. Moreover, empirical evidence was found for the factors that were considered to be relevant in the third phase of technology dominance. Additionally, it was also found for the first time that a few factors believed to be crucial in the fourth phase of technology dominance were found to be essential already in the third phase of standards battle between charging standards. The statistical analysis tests used in this research can also be used where there are more than two experts involved in the application of the BWM. Finally, the results obtained in this research provide empirical evidence to assign weights to the relevant factors and analyze the importance of those weights to explain their influence in the standardization using the BWM approach.
From a managerial point of view, a few practical contributions were also made during this research. The technology managers can use the proposed framework for the selection of charging standards globally in the future. The combination of the proposed framework and the BWM approach can be used to analyze technologies within similar domains in a situation of multi-mode standardization. The identified factors in the framework can be used to define strategies by the technological managers in the market to gain an edge over competitors in the market. Furthermore, the newly introduced factors in the proposed framework influence the members of the committees and help them to arrive at a consensus in standard development organizations. These factors can not only be validated by the technology managers but also by the committee members representing other aspects in the process of technology standardization. The proposed framework can be modified by the addition of new factors based on the relevance in the technology battle. With the increasing number of startups in the market, the framework can act as a guidance tool for entrepreneurs to analyze, validate and evaluate various factors that could influence the standardization of their product in the market.