Chargemaster and Telefonica UK Join Forces for Electric Vehicle Charging

Chargemaster Plc and Telefonica UK, which operates the O2 brand, today announce that they will be working together in the provision of electric vehicle charging services. The agreement initially sees Telefonica providing M2M (machine-to-machine) technology to connect Chargemaster’s UK-wide network of electric vehicle charging stations.

Launched last week, POLAR is the UK’s largest private sector-funded national charging network and has been developed by Chargemaster in close collaboration with motor manufacturers. Telefonica’s M2M offering will see sim cards embedded into each charging point, communicating back to a central database via the mobile network, ensuring that customers can quickly authorise themselves when using a charging point.

The agreement combines Chargemaster’s experience in electric charging with Telefonica’s mobile expertise, and will also see the two companies collaborate further in the development of services which provide simple and helpful solutions for customers to help stimulate the adoption of electric vehicle charging services. For example, services that allow customers to find their nearest charging point and pay for using it all via their mobile phone.

David Martell CEO of Chargemaster Plc commented, ‘we are delighted to form this relationship with Telefonica. Chargemaster through its POLAR network is leading the market in the expanding world of low carbon motoring. The two companies’ strengths are complementary and we very much look forward to working with Telefonica.’

Gilli Coston, Head of M2M at Telefonica UK said, ‘we are committed to bringing products and services to market that help our customers live more sustainable lives. Electric cars represent a huge potential growth area and working with Chargemaster we hope to develop a range of services to help our customers and to boost this fledgling market.’

Telefonica is already a leading global player in the use of M2M technology in the transport sector, particularly in the field of fleet management. Last month, Telefonica and Masternaut agreed to jointly market telematics-enabled fleet management services to business customers.

This agreement between Telefonica and Chargemaster joins a range of environmental initiatives that sit under Telefonica’s O2 Think Big sustainability programme. Through Think Big Telefonica/O2 is committed to developing products and services that help its customers live more sustainable lives. These have ranged from Sim-only tariffs that help encourage customers to hang onto their phones for longer, to the industry’s first eco rating mechanism to show customers the sustainability impact of different mobile phones, and to O2 Recycle which makes it easy for customers to recycle their old handsets.

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