Sometimes the current is too strong. The marketing of a solution for connecting electric vehicle terminals in multi-unit buildings last week by a subsidiary of Hydro-Québec casts a shadow over Quebec SMEs who fear this new competition.
Axso, 97% owned by Hydro-Québec, launched Eddie in mid-April, an electric vehicle charging management software system designed expressly to untangle the complex situations of multi-residential buildings. As Axso explains, electric vehicles are sometimes plugged in for up to 12 hours a day, unused, while they are recharged in just 2 or 3 hours. There is therefore a way to optimize the charging time so that it takes place outside of the famous peak hours during which electricity demand is already at its peak.
Multi-residential buildings, in which more than a third of Quebecers live, are not all connected in the same way to the Hydro-Québec network. Some buildings have an individual meter for each unit, while others have a single meter for the entire building. In both cases, matching the right vehicle to the right resident is a small puzzle that requires a solution, which can be software or hardware.
To help co-ownership managers and tenants navigate, Axso has developed a software application that sorts it all out. Eddie even gives its users a real-time and remote overview of the use of terminals connected to its platform. Ultimately, each resident pays for what they consume. Eddie’s mobile application can also be used with the Electric Circuit network of public terminals, also managed by Hydro-Québec.
Alexandre Bérubé, the CEO of Axso, evokes, in a press release, a “unique technology, designed and developed here in Quebec, which overcomes the challenge of accessibility to charging stations in multi-dwellings”. This solution “will transform the charging market in North America,” he adds.
One more technology
Eddie is not the only solution of its kind in the country. First, Hydro-Québec had in mind to produce a software application roughly similar to that of other operators of both private (residential or commercial) and public terminal networks, such as that of the Californian manufacturer ChargePoint.
Then, at least three Quebec companies have specialized for several years now in the development of connection solutions for electric vehicles intended for multi-unit buildings.
Elmec, from Shawinigan, is one of the main manufacturers of terminals in Canada. Its range includes at least one model designed specifically for multi-unit buildings and condominiums.
Established in Laval and Toronto, Fusion Énergie has designed a platform for optimizing the charging of electric vehicles comparable to that of Axso, which is also intended for use in multi-residential or commercial buildings. Its technology is present in 300 housing units, including several hotels and condominium towers in Greater Montreal.
RVE, also from Laval, has developed a hardware solution designed for buildings where each dwelling has its own electric meter. It allows you to assign a terminal to a counter. It also makes it possible to optimize energy consumption based on pricing and the use of other energy-intensive devices, such as a clothes dryer. RVE is present in 2,000 buildings in Quebec, and estimates that its technology can be used in “80% of all multi-unit buildings in the province”.
RVE also received last November 7 million from the government of Quebec, Investissement Québec, Fondaction and Export Development Canada (EDC) to expand in Quebec and elsewhere in North America.
More collaboration
At RVE, we would have liked Hydro-Québec to show a little more collaboration with companies which, like it, risk suffering the negative effect of its arrival in a market very similar to theirs. “We are already receiving calls from clients who are putting their project [d’installer des bornes de recharge] on break, time to think,” explains to Duty David Corbeil, co-founder and CEO of RVE.
In principle, Axso’s technology does not directly compete with that of RVE. But the Laval SME just wants to be reassured, and hopes that its growth will not be curtailed by the arrival of a subsidiary of the state company in its niche.
“The two technologies are complementary, and if it’s only complementary, that’s good news. The multi-unit building market is still emerging, says David Corbeil. But Eddie might come and cover some of what we’re doing. And if it does, we will never be able to play on equal terms against Hydro-Québec. »
On the Hydro-Québec side, we are reassuring. After all, the market is still young, explains its spokesperson, Louis-Olivier Batty. “Axso’s goal is to produce a solution that is as open as possible. We understand that there are other solutions, but our goal is to respond to a growing need and integrate any terminal, in the long term, to give them access to dynamic pricing and an advantageous off-peak rate. . »