USA: Ionna reports 100 operational charging sites

The recently established joint venture Ionna launched its first sites in the US around 13 months ago. To date, it has expanded to 100 locations with nearly 1,000 charging points. On average, this means the Ionna network comprises charging hubs with roughly ten charging points each. According to the joint venture, an additional 340 charging hubs with 3,700 charging points are already in the final planning stages. This brings the total number of ‘contracted’ charging points nationwide to 4,700, the company emphasises. The latest charging hubs have recently become operational in Forest Park and West Point, Georgia, and Limon, Colorado.

Additionally, Ionna has announced plans for a second grab&go convenience store at a charging hub in Dallas, Texas, in the second quarter of this year. The store will operate unmanned and feature Amazon’s ‘Just Walk Out’ technology.

A notable feature of the network, as Ionna CEO Seth Cutler told the portal Charged, is that around a third of the sites are covered—a feature still relatively rare in the USA. Furthermore, drivers can be incentivised to use the charging stations through discounts and promotions offered by the joint venture’s eight shareholders: BMW, General Motors, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, Stellantis, and Toyota.

The first discount campaign has been running for two weeks, targeting electric vehicle drivers from General Motors. They receive a 10% discount at Ionna when initiating the charging process via Plug&Charge or the apps of Chevy, GMC, or Cadillac. Two additional founding manufacturers are set to introduce their own discounts in March and April, with the remaining five shareholders following later in the year.

The portal Charged notes that most of Ionna’s sites are currently located along the West Coast, in the southern and central states south of Interstate 80, and along parts of the East Coast. However, states such as Michigan and New York have yet to be developed. This is expected to change as the rollout progresses. As a reminder, Ionna aims to deploy a total of 30,000 charging points across North America by 2030, with its current focus solely on the USA.

As recently as late 2023, the fast-charging joint venture announced plans to invest over $250 million in its fast-charging network in California alone within three years. More than 1,000 of the already contractually secured charging points are set to be installed there. Californian charging hubs are already operational in locations such as San Francisco, Sacramento, San Diego, San Jose, and Westminster.

chargedevs.com, ionna.com