If you’re undecided about electric vehicles, Josh Aviv wants to address one of your main concerns: “range anxiety.”
It’s the nervous feeling that EV owners or potential buyers get when they’re worried that their EV doesn’t have enough battery power to reach its destination. What if, instead of looking for a charging station, you could ask someone to meet you and charge your car wherever you are?
This is the idea behind SparkChargeSomerville, Massachusetts-based Aviv startup launched in 2017. The company makes portable battery chargers that can be delivered to your doorstep or wherever your car needs a charge.
“You can pick the time, location, choose your vehicle, the range you want, and with the push of a button it’s delivered to you,” said Aviv, the company’s co-founder and CEO, aged 30 years old. CNBC Do it. “So the same way you would order food from Uber Eats or GrubHub, you can now have your vehicle powered up.”
There is currently More electric vehicles on the road than ever – with a record 6.6 million sold in 2021, double the previous year’s total.
According to a May 2022 Report From Ernst and Young who interviewed more than 13,000 people around the world.
Aviv’s idea garnered a lot of support. SparkCharge has raised around $30 million from investors like Mark Cuban, Tale Venture Partners and rapper Pusha-T. In October 2020 spear SparkCharge on ABC’s “Shark Tank,” where Cuban and Lori Greiner have teamed up to pledge $1 million for a 10% stake in the company.
The investments currently value SparkCharge at around $110 million, according to Aviv. The company has already entered into partnerships with major brands such as Kia Motors, Hertz and Uber – and is on track to generate $10 million in revenue this year, Aviv adds.
How it works
SparkCharge subscribers across 121 United States cities can schedule a charging appointment with one click.
At your appointment time, a technician brings Roadie portable charging units to your car, whether it’s parked at your home, office, or almost anywhere else. The service cannot be called if your car dies on the side of a freeway, depending on the FAQs for the SparkCharge app.
You don’t even have to meet your car technician, as long as he can access the car’s charging port.
Roadie units can provide up to 100 miles of additional range in less than two hours, charging at a rate of about one mile per minute, Aviv says. The service can only charge your car to 80% capacity, so SparkCharge is banking on the convenience that’s worth it.
Subscription packages range from $5 to $30 per month. At the cheapest tier, you pay $0.69 per kilowatt-hour (kWh). This price drops to $0.51 per kWh with the most expensive subscription.
The average cost of 16 gallons of gasoline is currently nearly $50, according to AAA. Charging a 40kWh EV battery to 80% capacity would cost up to $22.08, SparkCharge’s highest advertised rate.
“We can cover this whole city with energy”
Aviv came up with the idea of charging mobile electric vehicles in 2014 while studying economics at Syracuse University. During environmental economics coursehis teacher announced to the room, “If you want to solve a huge problem for the world, solve the problem of infrastructure for electric vehicles,” Aviv recalls.
The professor invited all students interested in taking up the challenge to meet after class.
“I was the only person to show up and meet him,” says Aviv.
The idea for a portable charging system eventually earned Aviv a spot in Syracuse’s Blackstone LaunchPad innovation program. In 2017, he received his first financial support, winning $4,500 In a competition launching university startups to build prototypes of what would become the Roadie charging units.
A year later, SparkCharge won $1 million in the annual pitch competition organized by the technology accelerator 43 North.
The company spent the next few years perfecting the Roadie’s designs, beginning deliveries in mid-2021. This year, it says it’s on track to deliver more than a million miles of battery power to customers.
Aviv hopes to expand to other cities, including San Diego, Phoenix and New York, in 2023. The company’s mobility allows it to establish a presence in a new city within weeks, he adds.
“We can be up and running in a city in less than 14 days,” says Aviv. “We can cover this entire city with energy.”
Disclosure: CNBC has exclusive off-network cable rights to “Shark Tank.”
Register now: Be smarter about your money and your career with our weekly newsletter
0 Comments