By Nick Carey
LONDON, Nov 17 (Reuters) - Electric vehicle charging station maker Tritium said on Tuesday it is launching a new "scalable" platform so its customers can expand stations to charge more cars at once or change the speed at which they provide a charge.
The new charging platform will hit the market in the second quarter of 2021 and will be available worldwide. It will provide customers of Brisbane, Australia-based Tritium the flexibility to build a smaller charging station with the built-in capacity to add more charging points for EVs as sales and demand for charging infrastructure increase, founder David Finn told Reuters in an interview.
"We're really very focused on providing our customers the ability to scale out ... and do it in a cost-effective manner," Finn said.
Tritium is one of the world's largest charging-station makers and its customers include Ionity - the EV charging joint venture of Volkswagen AG VOWG_p.DE , BMW BMWG.DE , Daimler AG DAIGn.DE , Ford Motor (NYSE:F) Co F.N and Hyundai Motor Co 005380.KS - as well as Nissan Motor Co Ltd 7201.T , Honda Motor Co Ltd 7267.T and Harley-Davidson Inc (NYSE:HOG) HOG.N .
Europe is Tritium's fastest-growing market.
Tritium's platform will also enable customers to add battery storage to charging stations. As EV charging infrastructure develops, operators are expected to add battery storage so they can draw power from the grid during off-peak hours and use it to charge EVs during peak demand hours.
The company's new platform comes as EVs are likely to triple their market share in Europe this year after making up 8% of car sales in the first half of 2020, according to analysis by the NGO Transport & Environment. industry group said last month that Europe's rollout of vehicle charging points is not keeping up with that strong growth in electric car sales and warned a lack of infrastructure could hamper future sales of low-emission vehicles.