A British engineer is developing a system to monitor lithium-ion batteries in real time, aiming to reduce the risk of fires in e-bikes, e-scooters, and potentially electric cars. Nick Bailey, founder and CEO of Battery IQ, has created a low-cost circuit board that can be built into batteries to transmit data to a phone or scanning receivers in buildings, checking whether the battery is genuine and behaving normally.
Bailey's background includes founding Boost during the Covid-19 pandemic, a company that converted bicycles to electric power. He says he became concerned that generic battery safety systems were insufficient. “At the beginning of last year it became clear that this battery fire problem wasn’t going away,” Bailey told The Independent. “It was rearing its head in electric vehicles catching fire as well as scooters and e-bikes.”
New figures from business insurer QBE show UK fire brigades attended 1,760 lithium-ion battery fires in 2025, equivalent to 4.8 per day, a 147% increase since 2022. E-bikes accounted for 520 of those fires, close to a third of the total.
Battery IQ's system is designed to provide always-on safety monitoring, flagging problems before they become dangerous. Bailey says the goal is to give batteries a “safety passport” that can be checked continuously, rather than relying on one-off inspections. “What that doesn’t do is let you drive into a car park and the car park know that that battery is performing as it should do,” he said.
For building owners and insurers, the technology could help manage the risk of counterfeit or damaged batteries. Bailey notes that currently, installing an e-bike park often requires placing it in a metal box or installing a fire suppression system. The new monitoring system could offer a simpler solution.
