EV Realty Announces Growth Investment, Expands Expert Leadership Team to Provide Turnkey, Scalable Fleet Charging Infrastructure
Notable Investors including NGP, Segue Infra, Fifth Wall, Broadscale and Alpaca Provide Growth Capital Company Welcomes Former GE, PG&E and ChargePoint Execs to Support Expanding “Grid-Ready” Portfolio
EV Realty, Inc. (“EV Realty”), an EV infrastructure development platform purpose-built to maximize electric power availability for critical commercial fleets, today announced that it secured a $28 million investment from leading energy transition investors and expanded its executive team. Enabled by its founders’ decades of relevant leadership experience and unique understanding of the electric grid, renewable energy and the challenges facing commercial fleet operators, EV Realty is developing grid-scale charging infrastructure designed for fleet customers at strategically sited “powered-properties” in key commerce hubs and along last-mile routes.
According to a 2020 report from the Brattle Group, an estimated $125 billion investment in grid updates and infrastructure is required by 2030 to support EV deployment. Against this backdrop of a constrained grid, EV Realty is focused on identifying and developing a portfolio of near-term, grid-ready charging depot projects that will power critical commercial operations, including delivery, utility, telecom, vocational and other light and medium-duty fleets. To support its expanding development portfolio, EV Realty recently raised institutional capital from NGP ETP, the energy transition investing platform of NGP, and Segue Sustainable Infrastructure, with participation from Fifth Wall, Broadscale Group and Alpaca.
“We’re excited to partner with EV Realty as they are the first company to bring together a diverse executive team and investor group with experience from mobility, power, and real estate to support commercial fleet customers’ transition to electric vehicles,” said Greg Lyons, Principal at NGP. “NGP has been at the forefront of backing innovative companies tackling the energy transition and we look forward to supporting the EV Realty team as they create this new real estate and infrastructure asset class and develop scalable, high-use charging projects within the constraints of the electric grid.”
EV Realty recently welcomed three key executives to its leadership team: Jim Ludovico as Chief Customer Officer; Suncheth Bhat as Chief Business Officer; and Shana Patadia as Senior Director of Business Development. Ludovico joins as a GE leadership veteran and the former Managing Director of the Western U.S. for Element Fleet Management, where he delivered hundreds of thousands of fleet vehicles to key global accounts in the last-mile delivery, telecom services and oilfield services sectors. In his previous role, Bhat served as the Director of Clean Energy Transportation for northern California utility Pacific Gas and Electric where he led the utility’s EV strategy and programs, including the installation of 240 light, medium, and heavy-duty charging infrastructure projects across 80 cities. Patadia joins from ChargePoint where she was the Director of Emerging Technologies, Business Development, overseeing EV fleet partnerships for ride-share, rental car and autonomous vehicle customers.
“The electrification of the transportation sector is an enormous opportunity to transform society by significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” said Suncheth Bhat, Chief Business Officer of EV Realty. “The grid is central in this transition and understanding how to effectively collaborate with utilities is essential in supporting our customers’ efforts to decarbonize their fleet operations and realize fuel savings.”
“Our expanded leadership team represents the best in class from renewables to grid management and mobility to electrification,” said Patrick Sullivan, CEO of EV Realty. “Through our collective experience we understand how to develop, finance and build clean infrastructure at scale, optimized for the built electrical distribution system and working with utilities as long-term partners. The electric grid in the U.S. was never designed to be the fuel source for 50 million, let alone 300 million vehicles. Powered property is already hard to come by, and as our customers transition to EV fleets, our grid-ready depots will enable a turnkey, scalable charging solution for them.”
EV Realty was founded in September 2021 by executives who have collectively built nearly 9 GW of renewable energy projects across the U.S. in the last 15 years. Sullivan, formerly head of development at Clearway Energy Group, teamed up with Sean Kiernan (formerly of 8minute, Engie, and SunEdison) and Wyatt Toolson (formerly of First Solar and Chevron) to apply financial expertise, development discipline and scale economies gained from the rapid deployment of grid-connected wind, solar and battery energy storage to the emerging challenge of electrifying 50 million vehicles by 2030. Drawing upon their understanding of the grid and experience working with utilities to cost-competitively feed renewable power onto the system, the team turned to the inverse challenge of supporting the electric load requirements of large EV fleets where power is currently available.
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