IGL-Technologies, which offers the eParking service, develops Finnish electronic traffic in the long term
5 October 2024 by Tuomas Sauliala
Commercial cooperation. Original publication on Oikosulku blog.
Commercial cooperation: eParking // The electrification of traffic is a fact. the Swedish Transport Association, the share of rechargeable cars of all cars registered in Finland was already almost 9% in the summer of 2024. Measured by the number of units, this year there has been an increase of more than 5,000 charging cars per month. All these cars are charged somewhere, so it is clear that the business around vehicle charging is also growing.
Although the number of charged kilowatt-hours develops favorably, neither the turnover nor especially the operating profit of the players in the industry necessarily follows. Investments eat up capital, and they are made preferentially before revenue growth. Now in the summer, electric energy has been cheap , which on the one hand may have improved the margins of some charging operators, but also led in prices and thus turnover. Low-power chargers in particular are also quite simple to manufacture, and the industry is highly competitive, so margins in the charger store can also remain thin.
IGL-Technologies Oy's main product is the eParking system focused on parking and charging electric cars. It is therefore interesting to consider how IGL maintains its competitiveness in a growing and challenging industry on the one hand.
- Where only some cars are charged, all cars are parked, IGL's sales director Teemu Marku reminds.
IGL's service offering has long stood on two basic pillars, which are charging and heating electricity billing and public parking services. The eParking application can be used to pay for parking in the parking areas of many municipalities and cities.
Parking management and open interfaces to e.g. lift doors and booms and other parking control systems enable the development of very versatile parking services around eParking's smartphone application and cloud services.
Open protocols enable flexible operation in the electronic transport ecosystem
Product development does not stop at parking. eParking's Charging devices and their systems speak the open OCPP protocol (Open Charge Point Protocol), which enables flexible user identification and the use of different charging devices as part of the eParking application. For example, in Kuopio, in the parking garage of Savonia University of Applied Sciences' campus area, the eParking service not only has sato and eParking charging devices in the parking spaces, but also a few Kempower high-power chargers - all in the same system and with the same application using the OCPP protocol.
In addition to OCPP, eParking services also support another key protocol, OCPI (Open Charge Point Interface). OCPI can be thought of as a protocol between charging networks above OCPP, which enables communication between entire charging networks and separate service providers. OCPI is the cornerstone for a smooth roaming service between different networks.
The Roaming service, i.e. internet roaming, has a controversial reputation among motorists due to the surprising costs. Although roaming between charging networks may not be widely used these days, the idea is still good. IGL was, for example, involved in international research in the field as part of the USER-CHI project.
- Research and development of roaming services will certainly continue in the future, Marku reflects.
Open interfaces and smooth network roaming create the basis for the future's ever-wider business dealings with intelligent electronic transport.
Owners and strategic investments
Although IGL-Technologies has strong in-house know-how, it does not manufacture its own charging devices. The equipment has a few different suppliers, which improves the availability of not only charging devices but also their spare parts. The degree of domesticity of the devices and their components is high, which further improves delivery reliability.
According to the well-known saying, companies often look like their owners. IGL is still majority owned by its active management, so that charging device manufacturers UTU and Harju Elekter each own small slices. Charger manufacturers are therefore not just hardware suppliers, but strategic partners. When the owners go to work in the company they own and when the partner also has a stake, the interests are aligned for long-term cooperation.
Electronic transport is growing and becoming more common, but today it is hardly a goldmine for anyone. However, the industry as a whole is growing, and IGL-Technologies is strongly involved in the game.
Text: Tuomas Sauliala, photo: eParking
The author is a professional in electrical engineering, communication and marketing who has been writing about electric cars and their charging systems as well as vehicle software since 2013.
