SUN Mobility to almost triple EV battery-swapping network

SUN Mobility, a provider of energy infrastructure and services for electric vehicles, will set up 320 battery-swapping stations across India over the next few months, making its national network 500-strong by March 2023.

With this expanded network, the company – founded by Chetan Maini or the man behind India’s first electric car Reva – aims to do about 30,000 swaps a day by March 2023 versus 11,000 currently.

The news came less than a month after it opened a new Bengaluru factory that can make 200,000 batteries per annum.

Out of the 320 new battery-swapping stations, about 200 will be in Delhi, while Bengaluru will have 80 new ones, said SUN Mobility Chief Executive Anant Badjatya.

The company, which offers everything including swappable batteries and battery-swapping stations for two-wheelers, e-rickshaws and light cargo four-wheelers, is aiming to service 10 lakh electric vehicles by 2025 as part of its ‘Mission Million’ initiative.

“An important part of the entire thing is our partnerships. SUN Mobility came in as an enabler of an ecosystem,” said Maini. It has tied up with automakers such as Piaggio, Hero Electric and Greaves Electric Mobility; energy distributors Indian Oil Corp Ltd and Tata Power; and 25 fleet partners including Zypp, Amazon and Uber.

“My earlier journey was all about creating a car,” Maini said. “I think here, if you want to do something at scale, it needs to create an ecosystem of partnerships.”

The company currently has about 180 swapping stations spread across 18 cities.

In the fleet segment, while SUN has 10 swapping stations set up at Amazon warehouses in six cities, it has received interest from the e-commerce giant for 1600 more such stations, said Badjatya.