SUN Mobility, cKers Finance Partner to Decarbonise Last-mile Delivery

cKers Finance, an NBFC focused on financing sustainability and clean energy in India, has provided a debt financing facility to SUN Mobility, a provider of energy infrastructure and services for electric vehicles (EVs).

The capital being provided to SUN Mobility will be used to accelerate the deployment of electric vehicles integrated with SUN Mobility’s swappable batteries as part of the company’s MaaS (Mobility as a service) model, said an official statement.

As part of the partnership, SUN Mobility has already started deploying high-capacity Piaggio Ape e-Xtra electric three wheelers with third-party logistics (3PL) service providers. SUN Mobility launched e3Ws that reportedly offer them a high payload (500 kg+) and unlimited battery range (2-minute swaps). The MaaS model is said to allow customers to onboard vehicles with no upfront capital cost or need to own the vehicle.

“With this all-in bundled solution, the customers pay a monthly rental where the vehicle is provided to them with unlimited battery swaps, extending the vehicle range and operating hours. Fleet operators can scale up their business in an asset-light manner while utilizing SUN Mobility’s industry leading offering with lowest cost and highest uptime via a 2-minute swap,” claims the company.

The demand for last mile delivery decarbonation is driven by e-commerce companies, which are opting to replace their existing fossil fuel-based last mile delivery fleets with EVs with a cumulative target of deploying over 50,000 EVs in the next 3 years.

Talking about the cKers facility, Chetan Maini, co-founder and Chairman, SUN Mobility said, “SUN Mobility is currently engaged with a number of OEMS, fleet operators, financers and end consumers to develop a robust EV ecosystem in India…We are targeting to deploy over a million EVs by 2025, towards achieving this goal.”

Deepak Gupta, Business Development Head at cKers, said, “The last mile delivery segment is poised to see a significant deployment of eSCVs (Electric Small Commercial Vehicles) fleets over the next 3 years given the strong operating cost advantage. cKers has been investing in EVs for over 2 years now and has already committed lines enabling deployment of over 2,500 e2Ws and 1,000 electric e3W-loaders by the end of current financial year, giving it a head start in financing clean mobility.”