BMW has just signed a cooperation agreement with the Chinese state-owned energy supplier State Grid to drive forward the expansion of the Chinese store network for electric cars. One of the goals is to more than double the existing range of charging points to around 270,000 by the end of this year.

In an economic stimulus package following the Corona crisis, the German government has included several measures to promote electric mobility. The most powerful one is that the state is doubling its share of the environmental bonus in the form of a new “innovation premium”.

Finnish company Caverion and the high power charging joint venture Ionity have entered into an international service partnership. Caverion is responsible for the maintenance and service of transformers at Ionity’s HPC stations for electric vehicles in Norway, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

ICEing has been a problem yet to be defrosted but this recent coverage of a Tesla Supercharger station in Las Vegas does put an extra sour cherry in the mix.

Polestar will be cooperating with Plugsurfing in Europe to offer its customers access to the 195,000 charging points of the Plugsurfing network. This should make public charging easier across national borders.

The Indian energy provider Tata Power plans to expand its network of smart EV charging points in India from the current approx. 170 now to over 700 by end of the financial year under the subsidiary brand name of Tata Power EZ Charge.

The Californian city of Pasadena is opening the Marengo Charging Plaza at 155 E. Green Street. The Plaza is now home to a total of 44 chargers including 24 Superchargers installed by Tesla and 20 fast chargers installed by the City of Pasadena.

Australian fast-charging station manufacturer Tritium has launched its Plug and Charge solution. The technology leverages the ISO15118 standard and enables an electric vehicle and charger to communicate. Payments are authorised directly from the driver’s account without the need for a card or RFID tag.

With over 14,000 DC charging stations installed, the Swiss ABB group is among the biggest suppliers of charging infrastructure. The market is developing quickly and will continue to change at a rapid pace in the coming years.

The UK utility Octopus Energy launched a new roaming charging service, which will allow EV drivers to access multiple charging networks with one account. Unaffiliated customers can also use the Electric Juice Network scheme.

EnBW and Smatrics found Smatrics mobility+ GmbH. The joint venture aims to operate the largest charging network in Austria and, above all, to expand high power charging. All Smatrics charging stations will be transferred to the new operating company.

Following real-life testing, Ford is updating the fast-charging data for the Mustang Mach-E. In the ‘Extended Range’ variant with battery and rear-wheel drive, the SUV’s charging performance is around 30% higher than the values stated before, the car manufacturer reports.

The British Department of Transport (DfT) has set new targets for the expansion of ultra-rapid charging infrastructure for electric vehicles. The plans envision the construction of at least six HPC sites along motorways by 2023.

The Swiss company Huber+Suhner has presented a liquid-cooled charging cable system which is designed to enable continuous charging with 500 A even at very high temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius. With a voltage of 1,000 volts, charging capacities of up to 500 kW are conceivable.

ABB has agreed with Norway’s largest food wholesaler ASKO and its owner NorgesGruppen to supply the charging infrastructure for its growing fleet of electric vehicles.

Slovakian navigation specialist Sygic has introduced an electric car mode to its App Sygic GPS Navigation. The new EV Mode allows route planning with compatible charging points, payment without installing an additional app and real-time data from the stations.

EV powertrain developer Lightning Systems has just announced Lightning Mobile, a mobile DC fast charger for electric vehicles. The mobile fast charger can be quickly deployed to provide fast roadside charging to support the operation of electric fleet commercial vehicles.

ABB has received an order from Jönköping in Sweden to supply ten 450 kW pantograph rapid chargers. The installation is scheduled for the first half of 2021 with operation starting by mid 2021.

Fastned opened its first fast-charging station in Amsterdam this weekend. The Dutch company claims “hundreds of electric cars can be charged per day at this station” and that the design would allow the addition of more fast-chargers in future.

After first giving us his polarising observations on how not to make it in the business of charging infrastructure in last week’s guest contribution, the mobility consultant and former Hubject CEO Thomas Daiber now delivers the five biggest Do’s for growth and lasting success.

In Germany, applications for funding for the development of charging infrastructure can be submitted again with immediate effect and all online. An important exception for customer parking spaces is new.

According to latest insider information, charging infrastructure operator Allego is cutting a significant number of jobs. The offices in the Benelux countries and Germany are particularly affected.

The CHAdeMO Association has presented the new CHAdeMO 3.0 protocol, which was jointly developed with the China Electricity Council (CEC). According to the organisation, the charging standard will enable DC charging with a capacity of “over 500 kW”.

The energy supplier Fortum has signed an agreement to sell a majority stake of its public charging station operator Fortum Recharge to Infracapital. The transaction is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2020.

Deficient business models and a hardware-intensive struggle for locations: Looking back, the former Hubject boss Thomas Daiber sees the ramp-up of the e-mobility charging infrastructure as a permanent turning into dangerous dead ends.

FreeWire Technologies announced the successful closing of a $25 million Series B and venture debt financing round. The funding was led by existing investor BP Ventures, together with new investors ABB Technology Ventures and Energy Innovation Capital.

The Polish charging infrastructure provider Ekoenergetyka has received another order for electric bus charging infrastructure – this time from Radom. The Polish city is ordering two high-speed chargers for intermediate charging as well as a mobile depot charging facility.

Ford may be planning its own fast-charging network for electric cars called ‘Fastor Charge’. This is at least suggested by a filing from the manufacturer with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Ionity and the Extra MSA Group have expanded the UK high power charging network with a 350kW charging station for electric vehicles at Extra’s’s recently constructed Leeds Skelton Lake Services pit stop close to Leeds.

Electrify America announces agreement with Kia Motors America to offer ‘Kia Select,’ a new charging programme with optimised pricing for the all-electric Kia Niro on the DC fast-charging network of the VW subsidiary.