Here’s a look at the EV charging build out–and Blink Charging Co.

Competition to provide charging infrastructure in the U.S. and European markets is expanding. We recently talked about EVgo (New York symbol EVGO), because many investors were wondering if that stock was a risk worth taking. Now, here’s a look at Blink Charging Co. (Nasdaq symbol BLNK)—an owner, provider, and operator of electric vehicle (EV) charging equipment and services. 

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), electric car (EV) sales reached a total of 10 million in 2022. This was a 60% increase on the previous year, representing 14% of all car sales. China was the market leader with 6 million sales; the U.S. and Europe were well behind with EV sales of 800,000 million and 2.7 million respectively.  

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The IEA expects that global EV sales (including trucks and light commercial vehicles) will continue to grow rapidly, potentially reaching 20 million in 2025 and 40 million in 2030. This could represent 30% of all vehicle sales by 2030. The current U.S. Administration is targeting  EV sales of 50% of the overall total by 2030, up from less than 5% in 2021. 

Further supporting the rapid EV growth forecasts are the plans of the major manufacturers of conventional cars to significantly increase their EV production. Among the most ambitious plans are those from General Motors, Volkswagen, BMW and Honda. 

To accommodate the expected growth in EV sales, the charging grid will also have to expand and improve, especially in North America. The IEA estimates that there were 2.7 million public charging points worldwide in 2022, of which 1.8 million were installed in China, followed by Europe with 570,000 and the U.S. and Canada with just 160,000. This will have to expand to 13 million chargers by 2030 with large-scale expansion in the U.S.. 

Notably, the U.S. government intends to build a network of 500,000 public EV chargers on the major highways and $7.5 billion has been earmarked for an expansion of the EV charging infrastructure. 

Intense competition–where does Blink Charging Company (BLNK) stand?

Blink Charging Co. (Nsadaq symbol BLNK) is an owner and operator of electric vehicle (EV) charging stations. In addition to the charging stations, its products and services include software that keeps track of all of the charging stations in the Blink Network including data about the charging usage, etc.

The company also sells EV charging equipment and provides other EV-related services. It now has charging stations in 19 countries including the U.S.

Blink announced on June 21, 2022, that it completed its acquisition of SemaConnect for $200.6 million. That firm is a North American provider of 13,000 EV chargers, an additional 3,800 site host locations and more than 150,000 registered EV driver members.

SemaConnect’s hardware and software solutions reach a wide range of EV charging customers across municipal, parking, multifamily, hotel, office, retail and commercial segments in the U.S. and Canada. Major customers include CBRE, JLL, Hines, Greystar, AvalonBay Communities, Cisco Systems, and General Electric, among others.

With the SemaConnect purchase, Blink believes it is now the only EV charging company to offer complete vertical integration from research & development and manufacturing to EV charger ownership and operations.

In January 2022, Blink announced it is supplying its IQ 200 level 2 electric vehicle charging stations to participating General Motors dealerships in the U.S and Canada. The company reported that it had already shipped chargers to GM dealerships in 50 U.S. states and has orders to supply GM dealers in the U.S. and Canada with additional charging stations over the next several months

In the near term, many people are still working from home, so they aren’t parking their cars in office lots, limiting the immediate need for charging stations. Supply-chain problems remain a challenge as well, as they are for many industries.

However, increasing adoption of EVs is creating demand for charging. Roughly 608,000 EVs were sold in the U.S. in 2021, almost double the 308,000 sold in all of 2020. Charging capacity has to expand in line with the increase in the number of EVs on the road.

Moreover, many among the new group of drivers are less likely to have access to charging at home, which requires a private garage or dedicated parking spot set up with the necessary equipment.

Meanwhile, though, it’s still early days for EV stocks and EV charging, and as the market expands, it will very likely attract lots of new competitors.

Blink Charging is okay to hold, but only for highly aggressive investors.

Do you or will you invest in Blink Charging Company?