Union Square Ventures-funded REVOS has announced that it has launched BOLT charging points which can be bought and installed by anyone in their shops, garages, commercial parking spaces, etc.
BOLT charging points are compatible with any portable charger and work with the existing AC power supply at home and in establishments. The charging points can be bought for a one-time cost of Rs. 3,000 and opened for public use for a charging cost decided by the owner. Initially, the company is offering BOLT charging points to buyers at a launch price of Rs. 1 from October 29, till the end of December.
The charging units come with an energy calculator to monitor power consumption and payments can be made by the customer by scanning the QR code placed next to the charging point. At present, the company is not charging any other costs from the customers other than the initial cost of setting the charger.
Jyotiranjan Harichandan, co-founder of REVOS, said "Theoretically, our charging points can fully charge any electric vehicle within one hour, it is just that vehicles can't charge at that rate. We have some OEMs working with us who can fully charge their EVs in less than 30 minutes but there are also other EVs that take 3-4 hours to get charged. It depends on the EV's battery technology and portable charger that the OEMs bundle with the bike."
In the pre-launch phase, the company has installed about 2,000 charging points across 60 cities in India with an installed capacity of over 3,600 KW. The charging points can be located by EV owners using the REVOS BOLT mobile app.
Mohit Yadav, cofounder, REVOS stated, "A robust and pervasive charging infrastructure is key for rapid adoption of EVs in India. The PCO box revolutionized the telecom industry by making it available to the masses. BOLT is aiming to do the same for the EV industry by being ubiquitous; just like the yellow phone box, we envisage the green BOLT charging points in every nook and corner of the country."
The company has also built a BOLT operating system, which is a patent-pending modular system that can be integrated with any EV to turn it into a smart and connected vehicle with features like anti-theft locking, find-my-bike tracking technology to prevent the EV from being stolen. BOLT OS has been deployed in 10,000 devices (EVs and charging points) with 30 OEMs across India, China, Vietnam, Nepal, and Egypt.