itselectric, SWTCH Partner on Urban EV Charging Networks

itselectric, a Brooklyn-based curbside EV charging company is partnering with SWTCH Energy, a turnkey provider of EV charging systems for multi-tenant parking garages, to enable curbside charging units to draw power from building infrastructure.

“The country needs 1.2M more public EV chargers by 2030, particularly in dense urban neighborhoods. Today, the biggest barrier to deployment is the cost and complexity of connecting an EV charger directly to the utility’s main in the roadway,” Tiya Gordon, COO and co-founder of itselectric said, in a statement.

The partnership with SWTCH, which will deploy SWTCH software, “fully avoids this barrier, enabling affordable and scalable curbside charging,” Gordon said.

“We’re aligned with SWTCH in many ways, including our approach to closing charging gaps by pulling power from the built environment. This partnership now enables us to leverage SWTCH software to power our next-generation public EV charging,” Gordon said.

Both systems focus on deploying Level 2 charging posts, which are slower and less expensive units geared toward overnight charging. “It’s a very simple piece of equipment and it’s way more affordable,” Sam Bordenave, head of finance and strategy at SWTCH, told Globe St.

According to Bordenave, the cost of installing Level 2 EV chargers, including the equipment, is about $5,000 per unit. The units last about 10 years, he said.

itselectric is providing urban networks of Level 2 curbside charging posts at no cost to cities or property owners—it claims to be the only curbside charging network that offers revenue sharing to property owners.

“Once a property is deemed eligible, itselectric installs and maintains a low-profile charger, and property owners earn passive income,” Gordon said, in the statement. “With this business model, itselectric helps cities meet their carbon reduction targets and reduce capital expenditure by completely avoiding the utility infrastructure upgrades normally needed to support on-street charging.”

SWTCH’s EV charging management platform offers seamless control of the charging network, including turnkey driver billing and charging fee remittance, as well as 24/7 monitoring and maintenance alerts to ensure charger uptime.

Real-time monitoring will maximize charger earnings that will be passed to city property owners, while ensuring the reliability of itselectric’s charging network at scale, the joint release said.

“Dense urban areas require innovative, cost-efficient charging infrastructure solutions. Our open charging platform and energy management solution has been unlocking EV charging access in multifamily residents for city residents and itselectric chargers offer a unique solution for the curb,” said Carter Li, CEO of SWTCH.

“By partnering with building owners to maximize existing electrical capacities, and giving them a piece of the earnings, we’re solving the urban charger deployment problem,” Li said.