With Blink Charging’s rideshare arm, Blink Mobility, creating a stir among the on-demand economy companies and its stock prices recording a 5-year high, is the company all set to become the electric revolution’s dark horse? This blog post has all the details!
Blink is the brainchild of serial entrepreneur Michael D. Farkas, who started the company in 2009. After its parent organization ECOtality filed for bankruptcy, it was acquired by Car Charging Group, Inc for a meager sum of $3.3 million.
Since then, the company became a unicorn with its growth on an upwards trajectory. Here’s a round-up of the story so far:
Founded under the ECOtality brand name - 2009
Made its NASDAQ debut amidst much fanfare - 2010
Launched a new line of products including features such as autostart - 2014
Started treading in the European regions with the Eunice Energy Group - 2019
Acquired BlueLA Carsharing to provide rideshare options in Los Angeles - 2020
Received the Best of Corvallis Award - 2020
According to CEO Farkas, Blink follows a simple model of providing charging solutions to everyone irrespective of the vehicle they use or the location they reside at. When probed on his business model, he made it clear that the company makes money by “selling electricity.”
Keeping that in mind, their plain-vanilla offerings come with wafer-thin margins, but the efficiency levels of their services seem to be increasing by the year.
As of February 2021, Blink has entered into an agreement with Ballantyne Strong for adding EV charging stations in all its affiliate cinema screening venues. It’s the latest partnership among a series of deals and acquisitions made by the EV charger company.
Big names such as Johnson & Johnson, Burger King, Whole Foods, and McDonald’s have already committed to sharing infrastructure and property space so that Blink can spread its wings without spending on real estate.
In what was received as a unique move, the company also tied up with many colleges and universities across America. With this in place, students and faculty members of those institutions will be able to plug their cars in before heading for a class!
Furthermore, all the prospective locations are expected to come with local load management systems to optimize the time taken for charging. It means that a single-car would be able to draw power a lot quicker than five of them.
How Is It Priced?
Blink has made it a point to open all its stations for non-members. So when one’s Chargepoint membership runs out, or a Tesla Supercharger isn’t close enough, they can always drive into a Blink station.
With their plug-ins taking nearly 30 minutes to replenish a standard car like Model 3, EV owners ideally shouldn’t think twice before venturing into one of these stations.
Being a member is also quite lucrative since the prices go down to 49 cents a minute for Level 3 chargers and 4 cents a minute for Level 2 ones.
Moreover, the majority of the users, who prefer to charge in the convenience of their home, can get their hands on a home charging station for as little as $399.
Is the Network of Stations Extensive Enough?
With around 15,000 charging stations across the country, of which only half of them are public, it might look like Blink is nowhere near Tesla or Chargepoint in terms of reach.
But, if the company’s top management and market experts are to believed, this is just the beginning of a bigger and better network.
They already have 2,500 DC Fast Charging Stations in the US and are exponentially increasing their reach in South American and European countries such as Greece, Chile, Mexico, Israel, and Turkey.
Will It Continue to Blink?
The company’s market cap has soared to $2 billion in 2021, and this has raised many eyebrows across the board. Given that Blink hasn’t been profitable in over a decade, pundits are skeptical about seeing it rise like a phoenix!
On the bright side, Blink has made the right moves as far as entry and expansion plans are concerned.
Considering the data point that suggests that 51% of EV owners still charge in their home, it is also selling hardware products like residential charging stations and cables that are essential for all EV owners.
Their recently launched IQ 200 range of Level 2 chargers is a gamechanger that can fully charge a standard battery-operated vehicle in under five hours.
In another corner of their headquarters, Blink’s rideshare team has been slogging hard to disrupt the on-demand economy of their apps on Google Play Store and App Store. It could be a significant boost to resuscitate the company’s revenue figures.
Finally, the Biden administration’s grand plan of installing 500,000 plug-ins by 2030 means that the company would be expected to shoulder a good chunk of this burden!
To find out more about how Blink fares when compared to its competitors such as Chargepoint, EVgo, and Tesla, head here.
