Based outside Marseilles, this fascinating French startup is working on a new type of battery it believes could offer some huge advantages in the EV space, among many others.

Nawa Technologies' core product is a new type of carbon ultra-capacitor with a set of remarkable advantages over typical lithium-ion battery cells.

Ultra-capacitor advantages

To start with, as a capacitor, its charge and discharge rates are absolutely spectacular compared with batteries – up to 1,000 times faster. We're talking about charging an entire car battery in a matter of seconds, maybe three times quicker than filling a tank with fossil fuel.