Batteries
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6 MIN READ
India just gave EV batteries an ID proof. BPAN
The Ministry of Road Transport & Highways has proposed the Battery Pack Aadhaar Number (BPAN) – a unique 21‑character digital ID for every EV battery in the country, notified through draft guidelines released in the first week of January 2026.
As a product manager in the EV ecosystem, this is a landmark moment for how we build, ship, and manage battery‑centric products:
- Traceability by design: BPAN links every pack to its origin, chemistry, and lifecycle events, enabling end‑to‑end visibility from manufacturing to reuse and recycling.
- Safer batteries and fleets: Standardized, verifiable battery data can help reduce counterfeit packs, improve root‑cause analysis after incidents, and support smarter safety interventions in BMS, chargers, and fleet platforms.
- New data products: By combining BPAN’s regulatory identity with high‑resolution performance data from telematics/IoT, we can design risk‑based financing, usage‑linked warranties, and energy‑as‑a‑service models tailored to Indian duty cycles.
- Circular economy ready: Verified lifecycle histories make second‑life applications and recycling economics more robust, supporting India’s broader goals on resource efficiency and sustainability
For teams working on battery analytics, swapping, charging, or fleet orchestration, BPAN is not just a compliance checkbox – it’s a new infrastructure layer. The question now is: who will build the most impactful products on top of this identity rail?
What exactly is BPAN?
The Battery Pack Aadhaar Number is a proposed 21‑character unique digital ID for every battery pack placed on the Indian market, with a strong initial focus on EV batteries. Each BPAN ties the physical pack to a persistent online record that tracks its journey from manufacturing to end‑of‑life and recycling.
MoRTH’s draft guidelines issued in early January 2026 outline how this system will function, who must participate, and how data will be managed over time. In simple terms, it is Aadhaar for batteries, designed specifically to support India’s EV and circular economy ambitions.
How the BPAN process works?
1. ID creation at “birth”
- Every producer or importer must assign a unique 21‑character BPAN to each battery pack, including those produced for internal use.
- The BPAN must be visibly and durably marked on the battery (e.g., engraving/label) and also embedded digitally through QR, NFC, or firmware mapping so it is hard to tamper with.
2. Registration on the BPAN portal
- Producers/importers register on a central BPAN portal*, conceptually similar to existing EPR battery portals in India.
- For each BPAN, they upload static attributes: manufacturer, model, chemistry, capacity, configuration, production date, and intended application segment.
*Note : There’s no official BPAN portal announced yet .
3. Lifecycle event updates
- As the battery moves through OEMs, fleet operators, swapping networks, and service centers, key lifecycle events are tagged to that same BPAN: installation, ownership transfer, major repairs, and critical incidents.
- When a battery is significantly repurposed (e.g., moved from vehicle to stationary storage), a new BPAN can be issued and linked to the original record, preserving traceability across “first‑life” and “second‑life”.
4. End‑of‑life and recycling
- Refurbishers and recyclers record reception and processing of each BPAN pack on the portal, closing the loop under India’s battery waste and EPR framework.
- Over time, this creates a verified data backbone for material recovery, carbon impact accounting, and regulatory reporting across the entire battery ecosystem.
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Why BPAN matters for EV product teams
From a product management point of view, BPAN is a foundational identity layer that changes how EV products can be designed.
- Unified identity: BPAN can become the primary key that ties together OEM systems, telematics, charging, swapping, financing, and recycling data for each pack.
- Better safety and performance insights: Combining BPAN with BMS and IoT data enables pattern detection across batches, geo‑segments, or use‑cases, helping teams design targeted safety features instead of broad, blunt measures.
- New business models: With verified histories, products can support usage‑linked warranties, pay‑per‑use battery services, and risk‑based insurance that reflect how a specific pack has actually been used.
- Built‑in circularity: Product roadmaps can integrate second‑life and recycling flows from day one, because every pack’s lifecycle is transparently recorded.
How product managers can respond
Some practical directions for PMs in the EV space:
- Treat BPAN as a first‑class entity in data models, alongside vehicle IDs and device IDs.
- Design flows to capture/read BPAN at factories, dealerships, swap stations, and service centers.
- Build “battery history” views into dashboards for fleets, lenders, and service partners.
- Collaborate with compliance and operations early so that regulatory requirements become product differentiators, not just checklists.
BPAN is still in the draft stage, but the intent is clear: every EV battery in India will carry its own verifiable data room over its entire life. The opportunity now is to build the products and experiences that make this identity rail truly valuable for users on the ground.
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