EDF is reportedly looking to float electric vehicle (EV) charger company Pod Point on the London Stock Exchange.
The French energy giant is said to have asked investment bankers at Barclays to begin putting together a structure for a public listing, Sky News reported on Saturday 16 January.
An initial public offering (IPO) could see the charger company valued at hundreds of millions of pounds, highlighting the surging interest in the EV sector in particular with the sale of new petrol and diesel cars set to be banned from 2030.
Pod Point was acquired by EDF in February 2020 – a move that itself was reported by Sky the previous November – when it took a c.23% stake together with Legal and General as part of a joint venture.
Speaking to Current± today, Pod Point stated: “Unfortunately we are unable to comment on questions relating to investment.”
The EV charger company was set up in 2009 by CEO and founder Erik Fairbairn, and has now sold over 96,000 chargepoints with a network of 3,700+ public charging bays in the UK. This includes rolling out chargepoints to 600 Tesco stores, a deal that was first announced in 2018 and which hit a significant 200 installation milestone in July 2020.
EDF’s acquisition of Pod Point marked an increasing commitment to the EV sector, with Simone Rossi, UK CEO of EDF saying at the time that EVs will be “crucial” to reducing carbon emissions and fighting climate change.
The utility launched it cheapest EV tariff to date, with the GoElectric tariff announced in December 2020. Additionally, EDF powers ubitricity’s EV charging network, and was awarded a contract with the Crown Commercial Service to help accelerate the electrification of public sector fleets last year.
EDF is not commenting currently on reports of floating Pod Point, it told Current±.
