Inmotive and SOLIDWORKS: Steering the Future of Electric Vehicles

Inventor, co-founder, and CTO Anthony Wong launched Inmotive, Inc. in 2016 to focus on transforming his innovative multispeed electric vehicle (EV) transmission idea into a commercial product for licensing by EV manufacturers. Wong’s Ingear™ transmission extends EV range up to 15 percent and improves top speed up to 20 percent. To develop the Ingear transmission, Inmotive needed a user-friendly system that could enable its geographically dispersed team to streamline design communication, according to Advanced R&D Manager Misagh Tabrizi.

“Selecting a tool that could support an efficient means of innovation was critically important for our company because we needed to work with many development and validation partners based in different parts of the globe,” Tabrizi explains. “That’s why we chose SOLIDWORKS®. It’s the perfect system for creating and optimizing our design, building proof-of-concept systems in actual cars, and supporting prototype production.” Using SOLIDWORKS design tools, Inmotive quickly advanced Ingear development and completed proof-of-concept testing in record time.

Most EV motors use single-speed transmissions with two helical reduction gears between the motor and the wheels because the motor turns about nine times for each revolution of the wheels. The Ingear technology replaces the second reduction gear with a continuous chain drive and an innovative, morphing sprocket that resizes during a shift. When an EV motor can operate more efficiently, more battery power is used to move the car, and less is wasted as heat from the motor and transmission. Less waste means more miles from each charge.

Inmotive leverages SOLIDWORKS tools, including high-quality images and video animations of the Ingear, to effectively communicate and demonstrate how the Ingear transmission operates. Clear communications are vital to attracting and engaging EV manufacturing partners. Inmotive is pleased to have signed a joint development agreement with Suzuki in early 2023 for an Ingear two-speed transmission for a future Suzuki EV. “SOLIDWORKS has truly been an accelerating tool for us, enabling us to quickly progress from initial ideation to the testing bench,” Tabrizi notes.

Inmotive plans on adding the SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional product to its implementation to tighten revision controls and improve data security as the company grows. “Our goal is to develop best-in-class transmissions for EVs, and as we embark upon the commercialization phase, we simply need a better solution for managing our growing volume of product design data,” Tabrizi points out. “The two-speed Ingear transmission is only the beginning. Future plans to develop three-speed (or more) transmissions are not impossible,” Tabrizi adds. “As our development effort grows, we’ll look to the SOLIDWORKS PDM system to support our development needs just as SOLIDWORKS design tools have.”