Gogoro scooters are powered by two lithium-ion batteries that use the same Panasonic cells as Tesla batteries, with one charge enabling travel of up to 60 miles. When it’s time to swap in fresh batteries, a smartphone app offers directions to the closest station with available batteries (one is a 7-eleven convenience store). In seconds, the user replaces used batteries — which send vehicle diagnostics to the Gogoro network via Bluetooth — with the newest and most-charged batteries at the station.

Panasonic has bought into Gogoro’s vision. In November, Gogoro announced that the Japanese company had joined the Taiwan government and the billionaire Samuel Yin as Series B, or second round, investors in Gogoro, making it the second electric vehicle maker to attract Panasonic capital, the other being Tesla. Shortly after raising $130 million in Series B funding, Gogoro announced that it would expand into Europe, beginning with Amsterdam.

“The fundamentals of how people live changed in a decade with the smartphone,” Mr. Luke said. “If we put the same effort into how energy is consumed, how much can we change things in 10 years?”

Mr. Luke speaks from experience. He was chief innovation officer at the Taiwan-based smartphone maker HTC from 2006 to 2011, helping transform the company from one that made products for other companies to a global brand. While at HTC, Mr. Luke and a colleague, Matt Taylor, began discussing their vision for a new company that would leverage technology for social impact. Being based in Taiwan — where 14 million scooters serve a population of 23 million — scooters seemed like a good place to start.

“The scooter hasn’t seen much evolution in the last 20 years,” Mr. Taylor said. “We asked ourselves if we could apply modern technology to something we see buzzing in the streets every day and make a better product in the process.”