Tesla is expected to face strong competition from the third-party electric car chargers which have already established charging stations in most of the areas around the U.S. In comparison, Tesla has built up very few charging points in such regions, and in some, it has yet to develop a station.
Freedom Stations charge $10
The California-based EV marker has long indicated that building supercharger stations as quickly as possible is one of its major concerns, but their number has not gone up significantly. Nonetheless, Tesla seems to be making it easier for other companies to enter the EV industry. Last year, the company made its patents open source, enabling third-party companies to develop charging stations for Tesla cars.
As a result, NRG eVgo has been developing more and more charging points called Freedom Stations that charge an electric battery for as much as $10, says a report from DCInno. NRG has already established charging facilities in the majority of the U.S., including Virginia, Washington D.C. and Maryland, which provide services to electric cars from Tesla, Nissan, Chevy and other cars that are compatible with NRG’s charging system.
Does Tesla need to worry?
However, building more stations does not necessarily ensure continuous sales, especially when there are other better options on the market. Also NRG could lose Tesla customers, as the EV maker’s charging stations provide charging services at zero cost.
How much this free charging policy will hurt NRG depends on the amount of market share Tesla manages to gather. If the EV maker achieves its goal of selling 500,000 cars by 2020, then it would have control over the majority of the electric car market. Although things will certainly change in the future in terms of business models or success of other electric cars the industry needs to be more diverse in order to assist other companies seeking to compete with Tesla.
Though NRG competes with Tesla, in a way it is good for the latter as it provides the much-needed infrastructure to push the market for electric vehicles, and if such is the case, then Tesla CEO Elon Musk will be hoping that NRG soon expands to China where the company is struggling due to a lack of infrastructure.
