EVgo and Amazon Partner to Enable EV Drivers to Locate and Pay for Charging with Alexa

[electruck]

Wonder how/if Rivian will incorporate these forthcoming Alexa capabilities.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230105005303/en/

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--EVgo Inc. (NASDAQ: EVGO), one of the nation’s largest public fast charging networks for electric vehicles (EVs), today announced a partnership with Amazon to support an Alexa-enabled EV charging experience. This collaboration will allow drivers to ask Alexa to help them find and navigate to nearby EV charging stations, as well as initiate and pay for charging sessions at EVgo stations seamlessly. The companies plan to roll out the in-vehicle functionality to Alexa-enabled vehicles as well as automotive accessories like Echo Auto later this year.

“From Autocharge+ to charging with Alexa, EVgo is committed to continuing to raise the bar for convenience of EV ownership for our customers. EVgo is proud to be Amazon’s first charging network partner to enable this Alexa experience, and support its Climate Pledge to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2040.”
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“We want Alexa to be useful for customers in their everyday lives, and EV charging is a great example of a task that can be simplified and made more convenient through the power of AI,” says Anes Hodžić, Vice President, Amazon Smart Vehicles. “By partnering with EVgo, we’re bringing Alexa’s AI and multi-modal experiences to improve the EV charging experience for drivers and streamline the process of locating, initiating and paying for a charging session.”

Amazon’s Alexa-enabled EV charging experience is designed to leverage PlugShare™, the world’s leading EV community and a part of the EVgo Inc. family, as well as EVgo Inside™. Integrated with the Alexa app, the PlugShare API will allow customers to find nearby charging stations, access its comprehensive public EV charging map and ultimately take advantage of a seamless charging experience built from over a decade of serving the largest community of EV drivers in the world. With EVgo Inside integration, customers can also register a new EVgo account, find EVgo charging stations, initiate a charging session, and complete payment–all from within their Alexa app. In the future, customers will also be able to view real-time charger availability and view session and billing information.

“EVgo and Amazon’s shared principles of being customer-centric and committed to a sustainable future make innovative experiences like voice-initiated charging possible,” said Cathy Zoi, CEO at EVgo. “From Autocharge+ to charging with Alexa, EVgo is committed to continuing to raise the bar for convenience of EV ownership for our customers. EVgo is proud to be Amazon’s first charging network partner to enable this Alexa experience, and support its Climate Pledge to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2040.”

The collaboration with Amazon comes as EVgo continues to grow its base of partners across industries, demonstrating its ability to advance shared sustainability and electrification goals through a versatile set of charging solutions and technology offerings. Through this partnership, Amazon customers can access over 150,000 U.S. public charging stations listed on PlugShare.

Voice-initiated charging and payment builds on EVgo’s commitment to enhancing the EV driver experience, with the company’s recent launch of Autocharge+ allowing drivers to initiate a charging session in seconds by simply plugging in.

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[COdogman]

It would be really nice if they could somehow incorporate Plugshare’s crowdsourced information about functioning vs non-functioning chargers.

 

[Revelation]

It would be really nice if they could somehow incorporate Plugshare’s crowdsourced information about functioning vs non-functioning chargers.

I'd also love to see a "wall of shame" where if a charging stall is down for more than 72 hours it is front page. Then have all of the charging networks listed by number of chargers that are down with the top being the worst. Maybe they will finally start to care about their network.

 

[COdogman]

I'd also love to see a "wall of shame" where if a charging stall is down for more than 72 hours it is front page. Then have all of the charging networks listed by number of chargers that are down with the top being the worst. Maybe they will finally start to care about their network.

That might get their attention! Right now they seem to be taking advantage of the lack of options they know EV owners have.

 

[SeaGeo]

It would be really nice if they could somehow incorporate Plugshare’s crowdsourced information about functioning vs non-functioning chargers.

Plugshare doesn't track that other than informally via customer comments.

 

[COdogman]

Plugshare doesn't track that other than informally via customer comments.

Right. I guess I should have said I wish there was a way to quantify that so everyone can see it via the navigation screen Instead of having to check 3 different apps for each leg of a trip.

 

[AdamUCF]

"Alexa, are there any working chargers at this site?"

"I'm sorry, I can't answer that but probably not"

 

[AdamUCF]

Right. I guess I should have said I wish there was a way to quantify that so everyone can see it via the navigation screen Instead of having to check 3 different apps for each leg of a trip.

I built a proof of concept but not sure it's worth polishing and turning into something usable by the general public.

https://willitcharge.com

 

[COdogman]

I built a proof of concept but not sure it's worth polishing and turning into something usable by the general public.

https://willitcharge.com

I love it. It‘s clean and it gets right to the point of whether they are working or not. So you are pulling that info from Plugshare?

 

[AdamUCF]

I love it. It‘s clean and it gets right to the point of whether they are working or not. So you are pulling that info from Plugshare?

I bootstrapped it with data from EVGo and Electrify America. Honestly this would be sorta competition to Plugshare if I developed it fully so don't think they'd be keen on giving me API access. Though my access to the EVGo/EA data was just by mimicking the app with a regular user account and not through official APIs. I know there's other data sources for EVGo, ChargePoint, etc but haven't really researched too much. EA doesn't seem to participate in any data sharing (e.g. Rivian nav doesn't have charger status) so it's tricky.

 

[COdogman]

I bootstrapped it with data from EVGo and Electrify America. Honestly this would be sorta competition to Plugshare if I developed it fully so don't think they'd be keen on giving me API access. Though my access to the EVGo/EA data was just by mimicking the app with a regular user account and not through official APIs. I know there's other data sources for EVGo, ChargePoint, etc but haven't really researched too much. EA doesn't seem to participate in any data sharing (e.g. Rivian nav doesn't have charger status) so it's tricky.

Got it. That seems like it would definitely be tricky to keep up and running without that API access. And you know EA doesn’t want everyone to see that 75% of their chargers are broken at all times

I love the concept though.

 

[jeeden]

I know that it isn't the exact point of the article, but can you imagine how things would change if you had a bunch of Level 1, 2, and 3 EV chargers with Amazon or Prime logos on them that billed your Prime account (or had a certain amount of charging included in your prime membership!), interacted with Alexa, etc? It would really be something.

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