Recently, NaaS (NASDAQ: NAAS) announced that the commercialized demonstration operation of its self-developed charging robots has commenced in China Bamboo Expo Park at Anji, Zhejiang. The company plans to pilot these charging robots in expressway service centers at Hubei and Hainan, before progressively applying this tech advance across the country. In addition, the charging robot has recently been awarded "2023 China Auto Supply Chain Innovation Outcome" by China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM).

Beyond limits of location and power capacity in conventional stationary charging pile construction, the NaaS charging robot brings science fiction to life with a closed loop of automatic charging encompassing one-click ordering, active vehicle locating, precise parking, automatic docking, charging and undocking, and automatic settlement functions via mobile app. This technology can be extensively used in public parking and charging stations, expressway service centers, enclosed parks, ports and other charging scenarios, to help effectively alleviate the pain points such as shortage of charging piles, long waiting time, and limited charging space. It can provide 24/7 automatic charging service to EV owners, thus changing the charging mode "charging pile-oriented search" to “EV-oriented search”.

Empowered by deep learning, V2X, 3D vision and other intelligent technologies, the NaaS charging robot has achieved a number of milestone technological breakthroughs. Leveraging advanced image recognition, autonomous driving, location and control algorithms, mechanical arm trajectory planning, etc., in conjunction with camera, LiDAR, ultrasonic sensor and other environment sensing devices, it enables millimeter-level testing accuracy of charging state recognition, as well as independent route planning, vehicle control, automated obstacle avoidance. In a word, it’s the best cure for accurate recognition and location of charging ports in complex environment, smooth control of plugging/unplugging mechanical arm.

With charging robot as the cornerstone, NaaS has established a mobile charging and energy supply network step by step, which is complementary to the present public charging network. This enables flexible deployment of charging resources depending on periodicity and peak hours of charging piles in use, and helps satisfy public energy supply demand for EV. Entering an era of autonomous driving, the charging robot, built on headunit data and mechanical arm technology, is highly integrated with intelligent charging piles to provide autonomous charging service for autonomous vehicles.

As of September 2023, China recorded 18.21 million EVs, an increase of 1,400 times in the latest decade, and 32.5% of them are passenger vehicles. EV sales is expected to reach 9 million or so later this year. The rapid development of EVs provokes rising public needs for charging infrastructure. Especially during festivals and holidays, the heavy traffic would lead to explosive growth of charging demands. In this context, charging robots become the focus of attention in the industry.

Ou Hong, Deputy Secretary-General of National Development and Reform Commission, earlier proposed to build an effective and efficient inter-city charging network and appropriately place mobile charging infrastructure in areas of high traffic or during holidays and festivals, so as to add resilience to charging network. Relevant policies have been unveiled in Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Chongqing, Hainan and other provinces and municipalities to support and promote the use of mobile charging facilities. According to NewLink Research Institute, it is estimated that in 2025, the share of electric vehicles in China will reach 15%. Based on the current national average daily traffic of 26 million vehicles on expressways and 50 million vehicles on holidays, 100,000 fixed charging piles and mobile charging devices will be needed on a daily basis. Totally 190,000 fixed charging piles and mobile charging devices will be needed on holidays. There will be a 10-fold growth space compared with the current total number of charging piles in expressway service area.

As a new energy asset operator, NaaS was listed on NASDAQ on June 13, 2022. It provides one-stop new energy industry chain services, including charging station siting consultation, procurement of software and hardware, EPC, operation & maintenance, energy storage, PV and autonomous charging robots, among others, to boost industrial efficiency by leveraging digital technologies and AI. As of September 30, 2023, NaaS has connected 73,000 charging stations and 767,000 chargers. In Q3 2023, the charging volume of NaaS reached 1,383 GWh, representing 21.8% of the public charging volume in China.