Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) and Bounce Infinity have joined hands to fortify the latter's extensive battery swapping infrastructure by setting-up swapping points at BPCL's fuel stations in a phased manner. To begin from Bengaluru, the partners aim to establish 3,000 such stations across top 10 cities in the country.
The alliance with Bounce Infinity is a significant step by BPCL in its energy transition journey by creating a formidable charging solution for the E2W and E3W customer segments. Having already taken the lead by setting up fast charging highway corridors starting with the 900 Km Chennai-Trichy-Madurai-Chennai route, the alliance with Bounce Infinity will mark BPCL's strong presence in urban markets with a network of battery swapping stations.
Commenting on the partnership, P.S. Ravi, Executive Director In-Charge (Retail), BPCL, said, "BPCL has always been at the forefront of providing all forms of energy solutions for personal and commercial mobility to our customers. As we pace ourselves for an exciting phase of energy transition towards clean energy, we are delighted to partner with Bounce Infinity".
He added that BPCL is looking forward to offering an efficient battery swapping experience, especially in the urban markets where quick turnaround of vehicles is a primary customer need for personal mobility, freight and shared mobility segments.
"Battery swapping with pre-charged batteries from Bounce Infinity will significantly reduce the vehicle downtime adding customer convenience and reducing range anxiety. The interoperability feature offered by Bounce Infinity will help us to serve a larger spread of EV customers and will help in the growth of this important battery swapping segment in the EV space in the country", he observed.
BPCL's EV charging infra roadmap envisions a network of 7,000 conveniently located fast-charging stations along with a host of customer amenities in the country in the next 2-3 years, P.S. Ravi said.
Consumers looking to swap their nearly drained batteries can search for the nearest swapping location on the Bounce App. The smart framework will cater not only to the company's retail business, but will also support the interoperable OEM partners for ease of mobility across geographies, the company says.
Vivekananda Hallakere, Co-Founder and CEO, Bounce, said, "Bounce Infinity has been strategically partnering with prominent industry players to revolutionize the battery swapping scenario. This partnership reiterates our commitment towards a cleaner and pollution-free country by making our network accessible to consumers at the same scale and convenience as refuelling. We look forward to a long-lasting partnership between Bounce Infinity and BPCL".
Bounce Infinity Swapping network has a distribution of hundreds of smart stations across major Indian cities. In the past 11 months, these stations have seen over 1.2 million swaps translating to over 49 million EV kms. The company aims to build an infrastructure to support a million-plus e-scooters in the next 24 months.
The smart battery and the station carry numerous sensors and IOT that communicate securely with the outside world, the company claims. This helps the company to scale smartly and distribute the network without creating an imbalance in the grid.
The solution also supports bi-directional charging, also known as 'V2G' (Vehicle to Grid Technology), that goes one step further and allows the charged power to be pushed back to the power grid to balance energy consumption and production variations when necessary.
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