by Suman Gupta
New Delhi, July 02 ,2019: As part of its commitment towards sustainable mobility, MG Motor India andFortum Charge & Drive India have undertaken the first step towards creating DC Fast Charging infrastructure (50 KW) in the country. The carmaker today announced a tie-up with leading Finland-based clean energy major Fortum to install the country’s first 50 KW DC fast-charging EV stations, ahead of the launch of its debut EV in India – the MG EZS global pure electric SUV – later this year.
Under the partnership, Fortum will install 50 KW CCS/CHAdeMO DC fast Public Charging Stations for Electric Vehicles across MG’s showrooms in 5 cities including Delhi NCR, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Ahmedabad by September this year to begin with. One such charging station will come up at MG’s state of the art flagship showroom in Gurugram. The smart chargers can be accessed by an EV user, having cars compatible with CCS/CHAdeMO charging standards by registering with Fortum Charge & Drive India through its Mobile App.
Speaking on the partnership, Rajeev Chaba, President & Managing Director, MG Motor India, said, “The upcoming launch of MG eZs is aligned with the government’s long-term objective to have more electric vehicles on the road in the next few years. We are delighted to be partnering with one of the leading EV Charging service provider in the global EV space to set up charging stations at MG dealerships in select cities to begin with. This is in line with our goal to provide accessible EVs to India customers and create an EV ecosystem in India.”
Commenting on this collaboration, Mr. Sanjay Aggarwal, Managing Director, Fortum India, said, “We are happy to collaborate with one of the world’s leading automotive companies to bolster the adoption of EV which has been greatly promoted by Government by bringing out various enabling policy measures and guidelines. We have already witnessed an uptake in adoption of electric vehicles in the last one year. This collaboration will further bolster this growth. As one of the key players, we are constantly evaluating the Indian market for charging infrastructure and will continue to give a pleasant charging experience to EV user.”
With a full-sized boot and room for five, the MG EZS is the perfect car for people who want to drive an EV but also need the space and practicality of a compact SUV. The pure electric SUV is part of MG Motor India’s strategy to providing environment-friendly mobility solutions in India in the long-term and to make EVs accessible for customers across the country.
About MG Motor India: Founded in the UK in 1924, Morris Garages vehicles were world famous for their sports cars, roadsters, and cabriolet series. MG vehicles were much sought after by many celebrities, including the British Prime Ministers and even the British Royal Family, for their styling, elegance, and spirited performance. The MG Car Club, set up in 1930 at Abingdon in the UK, has more than a million loyal fans, making it by far one of the world’s largest clubs for a car brand. MG has evolved into a modern, futuristic and innovative brand over the last 95 years. MG Motor India has commenced its manufacturing operations at its car manufacturing plant at Halol in Gujarat.
About Fortum: Fortum is a leading clean-energy company that provides its customers with electricity, heating and cooling as well as smart solutions to improve resource efficiency. We want to engage our customers and society to join the change for a cleaner world. We employ some 8,000 professionals in the Nordic and Baltic countries, Russia, Poland and India. In 2018, our sales were EUR 5.2 billion and 57% of our electricity generation was CO2 free. Fortum’s share is listed on Nasdaq Helsinki. http://www.fortum.com. Fortum Charge & Drive is a pioneer in electric vehicle charging. As Charge Point Operator it has a network of more than 3000 smart chargers in Nordic country out of which more than 30% are DC quick chargers. Starting with a pilot in October 2017, Fortum has already made 40 DC Fast charging points operational in Delhi, Hyderabad and Mumbai sub urban area. Fortum Charge & Drive also offers a cloud solution to Electric Vehicle (EV) charging service providers and infrastructure investors. The cloud-based (SaaS) architecture enables flexible, pay-as-you-grow models, and white/grey label alternatives. This service is configured to suit a wide array of custom requirements, from back-end administration allowing an operator to see the status of charger, control charging (e.g. start, stop, restart), manage charging, connect and configure chargers, Remote monitoring and diagnostics, and Price plan administration, to the front-end branding of the consumer mobile app and web portal. The Charge & Drive SaaS cloud solution is hardware agnostic. The company has so far already set up 40 10-15 KW fast charging stations across various parts of India.
