CHARGE+ZONE raises $54M Funding as part of Series A1 Round led by BlueOrchard
By Sanjay Jadhav
March 21, 2023
Vadodara: CHARGE+ZONE, a leading EV charging company in India raises one of the largest rounds in equity and debt to expand the high speed charging network in the country led by BlueOrchard Finance, a member of the Schroders Group and a leading global impact investment management firm along with existing and new institutional investors. As part of Series A1, CHARGE+ZONE has raised $54M in which $8M is debt investment from an infrastructure strategy managed by Blue Orchard.
The funding arranged by BlueOrchard will finance an immediate roll-out of 286 charging stations serving 1,130 e-buses and e-trucks as well as over 1250 e-car fleets in addition to new expansion targets by CHARGE+ZONE. Overall, this will help achieve environmental targets to reduce emissions from internal combustion engines of diesel and petrol vehicles of 5,351 tons per annum. Over the long-term, the Series A1 funding for CHARGE+ZONE will contribute directly and indirectly to the creation of at least 500 jobs.
“As a part of our Series A1 fundraise of US$54m (INR450 crores) of equity and debt, we are excited to have BlueOrchard to be a part of our journey to build the supercharging networks for EVs in India and other global markets. In the current phase, we aim to build 3000 high speed DC charging stations by 2025 and expand our network to enable e-mobility across the fleet and personal EV segment including EV cars, buses and trucks. The current Series A1 raise is the part of the planned capex investment of US$300million, as we foresee crucial growth for the 4W e-mobility segment over the next 4-5 years.” said Kartikey Hariyani, Founder & CEO, CHARGE+ZONE.
The Indian automotive industry is the fifth largest in the world and is expected to become the third largest by 2030. With increasing usage of EVs, the mobility sector is expected to transform to a sustainable and resource efficient one as electrification of transport is key to achieving climate goals.
Aurelia Marti, Investment Manager, Infrastructure at BlueOrchard, said “We see a large and growing market for electric vehicles, driven by the need for more sustainable transportation. With its strong management team of industry and finance experts, CHARGE+ZONE is ideally positioned to capitalize on the opportunities in the Indian e-bus market. We look forward to working with CHARGE+ZONE to advance the electrification of transportation in India and contribute to the country’s climate and environmental goals.”
An early mover in the EV space, CHARGE+ZONE has positioned itself among various OEMs/eMobility/Locational partnerships including Hyundai, Mahindra & Mahindra, AshokLeyland, VolvoEicher, Tata Motors, Marriott, Hyatt, Fortune, Landmark Group who are India’s credible players and front-runners in the EV eco-system market. As of March 2023, CHARGE+ZONE has more than 3,000+ charging points across more than 1,500 EV charging stations in operations or construction in 37 Indian cities and has covered more than 10,000 kms of highways and aims to reach one million charging points by 2030. The company started off in 2019 with the commissioning of India’s first ever EV charging hub for 50 electric buses in Ahmedabad, Gujarat in 2019 followed by India’s first solar-powered EV charging station in Patna in 2022 and since then, it is providing charging services to reputed companies for their fleets of electric buses and electric cars. CHARGE+ZONE will increasingly integrate solar and wind power generation for their charging stations wherever feasible per the electricity regulations with respect to each of the state policies.
Additionally, CHARGE+ZONE plans to raise US$75-100m in equity as part of Series A2 during 2023-2024.
