– We have a thousand spin-crazy merchants – E24
NYBORG, DENMARK (E24) Ole Robert Reitan thinks Rema 1000 and Uno-X are a «match made in heaven». Whether the charging project will be as profitable as it looks in Excel remains to be seen.
On Friday, Reitan-owned Uno-X’s first charging station with 300 kilowatt power was launched in Nyborg, a long time’s drive outside Copenhagen.
During the summer, the first comes to Norway. Then it is largely local energy plants that will pay out the bottleneck for further rollout.
Of Reitan Retail’s 3850 outlets in Norway and Denmark, the company has identified 1000 of them as particularly relevant.
And the lightning chargers are most welcome, according to Rema 1000 director Ole Robert Reitan.
– We have a thousand spinnville merchants who want to be involved and get the charging station installed faster than we can deliver, he says.
Lightning charger at most stores
The first installation takes place on a separate Uno-X site, right next to the world’s third largest suspension bridge, the Great Belt Bridge.
The future lightning charging investment will to an equal extent be focused on Rema 1000, says Reitan.
– It will surprise me if most Rema 1000 stores do not have a Uno-X charging station in the parking lot in ten years.
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In addition, Ole Robert Reitan is reluctant to quantify his ambitions. With one exception, which the Rema 1000 top made sure that everyone present got:
– At some point in the medium term, I should be able to go into the app and see that a thousand cars charge on Uno-X stations at the same time.
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Reitan in a yellow leader jersey
A few dozen people showed up for the charging station’s official opening on Friday. Among them was Denmark’s Minister of Transport Trine Bramsen (Social Democrats).
She used the occasion to praise the new opening with the language of cycling.
The first three stages of the Tour de France go through Denmark this year. At the beginning of July, 200 of the world’s top cyclists will be whizzing over the 18-kilometer-long bridge connection between Funen and Zealand.
– Today you can say that the yellow leader jersey belongs to Reitan and Uno-X, Bramsen said to those present.
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– Earned a lot to wait
Lightning charging at Uno-X does not require a subscription, charging chip or the like.
– All you need is a regular payment card, says Vegar Kulset, head of Uno-X.
That the investment is happening now is related to the maturity of the market and the price of technology, Ole Robert Reitan explains.
– It is not always the case that «first mover» is the winner. We are now building charging stations that were either too expensive or were not available a year ago. I would say we have been dressy conservatives. And I think we have earned a lot from waiting until the market is modern and the technology is really priced.
The technology means that the charging stations and the cars “talk to each other” to find out how much power the car is to be charged on. Maximum power is 300 kilowatts. The chargers will make sure that the battery goes from 20 to 80 percent in 20 minutes, explains Ole Johannes Tønnessen, head of Uno-X eMobility.
He says that the station technology is ahead of the one found in the car. As far as E24 knows, no electric car can charge a full 300 kilowatts today.
– We are oversizing because we believe that the development is going in that direction. In 2027, most cars will probably be able to charge to 80 percent in 10 minutes, says Tønnessen.
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Excited to see if the calculations hit
The Reitan and Uno-X leaders will not specify the economics behind the lightning charge initiative.
– How long does it take before this first charging station will be earned?
– It is of course something that will be exciting. To see what kind of volume we achieve. But we have high expectations that it will be possible to drive electricity “on the go” with good profitability. We have a very good industrial concept. I add expectations for the cost price of the infrastructure to go down, says Uno-X boss Vegar Kulset.
– It is a sensible investment, as it looks now, is director Ole Robert Reitan.
He says that the expectations in advance are based on calculations in Excel.
– Then we will soon get an answer on whether the calculations correspond to reality, he says.
The Rema 1000 top says he believes in energy supply along the road in an eternity perspective.
– Uno-X is a mobility company. It was once a gas station chain, and once in the future it will not be at all. We must be part of that journey.
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