Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India – Relux Electric has secured Rs. 250 crore of cumulative project funding from a group of private real estate and infrastructure investors exclusively to expand its network of hyper charging stations in the highways of South India. The company will utilise the fund to create 20 new hyper charging stations within the next 8 months.
The only company in the sector which is operationally profitable from day one, Relux Electric is currently operating 100+ charging stations in south India. Located alongside highways and at strategic locations within cities, they cater only to private vehicles. However, the company is floating a new vertical soon for fleet operators and owners of commercial vehicles to set up AC charging stations in their locations.
Commenting about the project funding, Dr. Karthikeyan Santharam, Managing Director and CEO, said that Relux has identified land parcels in busy highways such as NH 44, NH 45, and NH 556. The company will procure lands and set up the charging stations, each occupying an area of 1 to 1.5 acres. Boasting a capacity of minimum 1 MW each, the hyper charging stations can let as many as 10 small to medium sized cars, 10 high-end cars, 2 buses and a truck to charge simultaneously. The charging stations will also have amenities such as eateries and shopping centers. The charging stations guarantee a 10-minute charging time for three wheelers, and 18-minute charging time for four wheelers.
Relux Electric has chosen the route of project funding for the current round of expansion, which is based on revenue sharing. However, as Relux Electric has an aggressive plan to exponentially increase the number of charging stations in its network within a year, company is already in discussions with investors and is willing to explore various funding options. Further Relux still having control on entire 100% Equity still even after this project funding. The company is expanding fast in Eastern and Western parts of India, having built a leadership position and strong presence in the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, and Andhra Pradesh. Currently, Relux Electric is valued at about Rs. 800 crore – and the company retains 100% equity. “We are able to make operational profit from day one as our focus is always on maximizing utilization – rather than on increasing the strength of the network. We are also committed to developing our own team for R&D, and operations & maintenance. An Original Design Equipment company, we procure charging equipment based on our own designs. These factors make it possible for us to keep the downtime to a bare minimum of a few hours, and ensure higher utilization of assets – up to 40%, which is double the industry average.”
On the launch of the new vertical, Mr. Karthikeyan, said that the vertical will focus on signing up builders of residential and commercial complexes, fleet operators and travel agencies, to use our dedicated Hubs for their needs, As we don’t want to club personal and commercials vehicles on the same place, which affects reputation and operation difficulties of space providers. So, We are doing dedicated.
