Investment Heat Is Picking Up for EV Charging Companies

In 2017, the first slice of EV charging companies entered an exciting phase as major energy companies like Shell, Total, BP, Enel, and ENGIE began investing and acquiring EV companies. It started with Shell’s acquisition of New Motion. Not long after, similar acquisitions of other key startups like Greenlots, eMotorWerks, ChargeMaster, and EVBox followed into 2018. At the same time, companies like ChargePoint brought in large investment round hauls relative to other industry players. As 2018 concluded, investment activity took a breather; however, 2021 has seen a busy first 2 months for the next class of EV charging startups.

Investments and Acquisitions Hit the Ground Running in 2021

Shell charged ahead with the acquisition of the innovative EV charging solutions provider, ubitricity in late January 2021. ubitricity is best known for enabling EV charging from existing street infrastructure, like streetlights. To date, it has installed over 2,700 charge points in the UK, which makes it the most abundant public charge point network in the country according to Zap-Map.

Shell’s acquisition was followed shortly by the closing of a $50 million Series C round for US-based FreeWire. The company is a pioneer in the field of battery integrated charging equipment. Its first product was a mobile charger supported by an 80 kWh battery, which has been used as an alternative to stationary charger deployments. Now the company has the Boost Charger, which uses a 160 kWh battery and can provide up to 120 kW charging sessions from low voltage grid infrastructure.

February maintained January’s momentum. Wallbox secured €33 million ($40 million) in Series B funding; Norwegian energy company Statkraft acquired the Swedish charging service provider Bee. Wallbox is a pioneer in bidirectional charging equipment, specifically bidirectional home charging, where its Quasar charger has been used to commercialize residential vehicle-to-grid charging in the UK.

Bee is an EV charging service provider in one of the hottest European EV markets: Sweden. Statkraft’s acquisition will merge the provider with the company’s existing charging network, Gronn Kontakt, and rebrand the merged company as Mer. Through prior acquisitions, Statkraft will have Mer in Norway, Sweden, the UK, and Germany.

Now Is the Time to Seek Funding

Looking ahead, 2021 momentum is unlikely to fade. Some of the older startups from the 2017-2018 investment surge will likely net further investment by going public. US charging service provider EVgo reached a deal to go public via a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) in January 2021. It is expected to close in 2Q 2021. Also expected to go public via SPAC in 2021 are competing providers, ChargePoint (announced September 2020), EVBox (announced December 2020), and Volta (announced February). The EV market is riding high following surprising resilience through the coronavirus pandemic and oil price crash of early 2020, with renewed support from the US federal government. As the flurry of investment activity may indicate, this looks like it’s a good time to seek funding.