Bengaluru based EV charging infrastructure startup, Charzer has announced its partnership with Omega Seiki Mobility, an Anglian Omega Group Company to set up a network of 20,000 EV charging stations across India in the next two years, further accelerating the shift to electric vehicles in last-mile logistics.
An in-house survey of 500 passenger auto-rickshaws and cargo three-wheelers indicated that 8 out of 10 drivers in Bengaluru do not have the required charging infrastructure at home.
In a city like Bengaluru, a conventional engine auto-rickshaw driver covers up to 150 km every day, whereas an EV auto driver can drive up to only 100 km, this is mainly due to the lack of charging options available on the go.
“This partnership between Charzer and Omega Seiki Mobility is aimed at addressing this pain point. Over the next two years, Charzer will install EV charging stations in 20,000+ locations,” the statement said.
Extended range due to ease of access to charging points can result in a 40-50% increase in the income of drivers.
Commenting on the partnership, Dheeraj Reddy, COO & Co-Founder, Charzer, said “For any logistics company, finding and managing ‘Park and Charge’ EV hubs is capital intensive and requires extensive use of labour and workforce. Setting up these EV charging hubs is a major deviation from the core business of a logistics company.”
Speaking on the partnership with Charzer, Uday Narang, Founder & Chairman, Omega Seiki Mobility said “We have a target of introducing 30,000+ EV cargo three wheels in the next two years. To achieve this goal, we are also working towards building a robust charging infrastructure that allows our fleet drivers to easily access charging stations at any given point during the day.”
“As a first step towards this, we have partnered with Charzer to build an extensive network of charging stations across the country. We are looking forward to working with the team for setting up the required infrastructure and removing any hurdles in the way of faster adoption of EVs,” He further added.
Charzer will deploy the charging stations across geographies where Omega Seiki Mobility clients will operate to ease EV adoption for them. It will also provide Charzer mobile application and website for the drivers to locate the nearest charging stations and to book slots.
The electric vehicle drivers can use a charging facility in a subscription-based model. Charzer is already working with Green drive logistics, which operates a fleet of 100+ Omega Seiki vehicles in Bangalore and supports last-mile logistics for companies like Amazon, Bigbasket, Porter, etc.