Kenny Fellows shares his notes from this year’s EV Charging Summit & Expo, after our team spent an exciting few days there, soaking up the latest industry wisdom and talking to charge point businesses from across the states.
Our US team attended last week’s EV Charging Summit and Expo in Las Vegas, which felt full of energy and motivation, despite the changes in the Federal government's position on electric vehicles. As my colleague David Patterson states: “The industry overall is recovering and regrouping after the administration change in US politics”.
We had a busy time, with myself, Co Founder Chris Chamberlain, and Sales Director David Patterson meeting with close to 60 charge point operators and industry players between us, and catching some fascinating sessions and keynotes.
The insight we gleaned from these conversations show some common threads happening across the industry. Most noticeable is the shift towards a commercial focus - the importance of the economic viability of charge points, the challenge of scaling networks, and the criticality of good data in driving profitable decisions.
The Big One - Data-driven
Data was a prevalent topic, coming up time and time again, not only during the team’s prospect and industry meetings, but within the event’s agenda and speaker sessions. It seems the charging industry is understanding the drawbacks of the subjective approach to setting up a charge point network, versus the sustainable success offered by the use of accurate, EV relevant, holistic data.
Charge Point Viability
The commercial viability of an EV charging site was also a topic of discussion, with panels, speakers and among delegates. It was clear that companies are recognizing the importance of determining whether a potential is an economically viable and potentially profitable choice for them, and for their network as a whole. This includes any existing charge sites they may have, with utilization data being a key piece of the puzzle for CPOs looking to expand their charging networks.
Scaling with Success
It was apparent that many CPOs are feeling frustration when it comes to scaling their charge point business, both in terms of their current processes as well as being able to move at pace in what is a fast developing market. Themes such as speed of site evaluation, and an inability to replicate site evaluation processes were notable, as well as both of these and other challenges leading all too often to a sub-optimal location being decided upon.
In closing, our CEO gave his thoughts on these insights from EVCS, in the latest issue of our LinkedIn newsletter, Decoding eMobility:
