LAS VEGAS — Mercedes-Benz is taking a web page out of the Tesla playbook on electrical car charging.
Mercedes revealed plans at CES to develop a worldwide community of 10,000 high-speed chargers powered by inexperienced power.
The rollout will start this 12 months within the U.S. and Canada and develop to Europe, China and different main markets by 2030.
In contrast to Tesla’s proprietary community of greater than 40,000 Superchargers globally, the Mercedes’ branded chargers shall be open to different automakers’ automobiles from the outset.
Mercedes CEO Ola Kallenius described the charging community plans as a “differentiator” for the model, which seeks to go all-electric by 2030 in prepared markets.
“That is about adoption,” Kallenius stated on a media name Thursday. “We wish to give Mercedes prospects world wide but another excuse to hitch us on the journey in the direction of electrification.”
The general funding within the charging community shall be within the “low single-digit” billion euros, Kallenius stated.
In North America, Mercedes will associate with renewable power and battery storage operator MN8 Vitality to develop the websites, and with gear supplier ChargePoint to produce the chargers.
Mercedes and MN8 Vitality will make investments about $1 billion within the North American community over the subsequent six to seven years.
“We imagine this can be a bankable asset,” Okayällenius stated. “That is one thing that it is possible for you to to monetize whenever you come out of the funding part.”
Charging infrastructure stays an important problem for EV adoption. Automakers have to date relied on a set of third-party public charging networks, however they’ve lacked management over reliability and the charging expertise.
Kallenius acknowledged a strong charging infrastructure is important to drive EV gross sales.
“Our prospects deserve a compelling charging expertise that makes electrical car possession and long-distance journey easy,” he stated. “We can’t take a wait-and-see strategy for this to be constructed.”
Mercedes-Benz seller Jeff Aiosa stated the model’s funding will assist transfer metallic.
EV adoption is being held again by a scarcity of affordability, buyer issues of vary nervousness, and insufficient public charging infrastructure, stated Aiosa, proprietor of Mercedes-Benz of New London in Connecticut.
However he stated a Mercedes nationwide community of quick chargers “ticks two of these three packing containers.”
By 2027, Mercedes stated it is going to have greater than 400 websites and a couple of,500 chargers in North America. The community will provide as much as 350-kilowatt charging and be upgraded because the know-how advances.
Whereas the community shall be public, Mercedes prospects will obtain particular pricing and preferential entry through a reservation system.
Different advantages embrace a Plug & Cost operate, which will not require Mercedes prospects to swipe a bank card or use a cell app to begin charging.
Like Tesla Superchargers, the Mercedes chargers will talk immediately with the car by way of the charging cable.
“There shall be seamless integration between the automobile and [charger] software program,” Mercedes-Benz Chief Expertise Officer Markus Schäfer stated on the decision. “We wish to make charging like fueling — a pleasing expertise.”
Non-Mercedes prospects will be capable to entry the chargers utilizing a wide range of fee features.
The stations shall be situated the place Mercedes prospects store, equivalent to luxurious retail developments and dealerships in main inhabitants facilities.
“It is about location, location and site,” Schäfer stated. “We all know the place our prospects are; we all know the place we’re promoting electrical automobiles.”