Esmito Raises INR 10 Crore In Seed Funding For Battery Swapping Infrastructure

EV start-up Esmito has announced that it has raised Rs 10 crore in a seed funding round that was led by Unicorn India Ventures. The funds raised will be utilized for the expansion of battery swapping solutions by Esmito. A part of the funds will also go to strengthen the technology team of the company.

Hasan Ali, co-founder, Esmito, said, “Esmito is rightly positioned in a rapidly growing and a fast evolving EV market. Based on our strengths in building scalable swapping technology, we believe that Esmito can unlock immense value for the end user thereby accelerating the adoption of EVs in the country.”

Ali also held that the booming battery swapping market coupled with Esmito’s strength of in-house technology capability can enable Esmito to lead the energy/battery as a service market.

Esmito said that it has come up with several electric vehicle technologies with centre for battery engineering and electric vehicles (CBEEV) besides working in the direction of standardization and policy evolution for speedier adoption of EVs and battery swapping in India. The start-up offers swapping solutions and energy as a service to logistics and last mile mobility players that include products integrated with web and mobile applications and embedded analytical modules.

Sparsh Kumar, Vice President, Unicorn India Ventures, said, “The EV industry, according to various estimates, is projected to see anywhere between 30 to 90 per cent CAGR, sustained through this decade and possibly even beyond. This roughly translates into EV sales overtaking ICE vehicle sales by mid-to-late 2030s with India becoming the 3rd largest EV market. Combined with the fact that this adoption is going to be much faster in the commercial 2W and 3W categories which Esmito aims to serve, we think that there is a lot of potential of rapid value creation in this space.”

The Battery Swap Dash in India

The battery swapping infrastructure is being amplified in India by different players. Bounce Infinity had entered into an agreement with Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) to strengthen the extensive battery swapping infrastructure in 10 cities of India with some 3,000 stations. It has also partnered with EV-maker Crayon Motors to establish the ‘first interoperated battery swapping network across India.

Bengaluru-based SUN Mobility had recently launched its battery-swapping network for electric vehicles in Mumbai.