Nicholas Johnson started a company because he lost a bet.
Johnson was having dinner with some investors in Lyt, a congestion management company he had co-founded. As the dinner conversation meandered, EV charging and the best way to get it into an apartment building.
Apartment dwellers who own electric vehicles are often left with two less-than-ideal options: public chargers or plugging their vehicles into regular 120-volt outlets, which adds about 3 to 5 miles of range per hour. Johnson, a Tesla graduate, wasn’t interested in the problem, so one of the people at the dinner made him a suggestion.
“I got a bet from one of our investors that I would drive to and from work, which was about 48 miles at the time, for six months charging my electric vehicle with nothing more than a level 1 outlet,” Johnson told TechCrunch. “He said, ‘If you don’t need to plug in a DC fast charger except for weekend trips, I win the bet and you have to build me a prototype.’ He won the bet and I built him a prototype.”
This prototype will form the basis of a new startup, Orange charger, where Johnson is now CEO. The company, which sells homeowners a 240-volt smart plug among other products, has raised a $6.5 million oversubscription round, Orange Charger exclusively told TechCrunch. The round was led by Munich Re Ventures and Climactic with participation from Baukunst, Crow Holdings, Lincoln Property Ventures and Space Cadet Ventures.
Charging has long been the Achilles heel of EVs, and few EV drivers know it as well as apartment dwellers, many of whom don’t have a guaranteed spot to charge at night. Today, the majority of electric vehicle charging takes place at home, but most multi-family residences do not have chargers or even outlets in every parking space. If electric cars are to gain mass adoption in the US, the 40 million people who live in apartment buildings will need a more convenient way to get some rest.
Many startups have emerged to solve the problem, and most of them focus on selling and installing enough charging equipment to serve a percentage of renters. Even then, it can be an expensive proposition, often costing a few thousand dollars per counter. Landlords are reluctant to install unless there are enough tenants with electric vehicles. “When you’re doing 100 or 200 parking spaces in a multifamily, you don’t really want to put 200 cables in a parking lot, especially when maybe 10 to 20 are going to be used the first day,” Johnson said. But at the same time, renters may be hesitant to buy electric vehicles without a convenient place to charge them.
Orange Charger believes it has a better solution and is betting that owners will prefer it. Instead of installing a swarm of Level 2 chargers, which provide enough electrons for several days of daily driving, the Orange Charger offers 240-volt outlets that are packed with smart devices. Electric vehicle owners can plug in the Level 2 portable charger that often comes with their vehicle and activate the outlet using an app.
The Orange Charger’s Level 2 plugs provide less power than a commercial unit, but still enough to add about 150 miles of overnight range. The lower power consumption means electricians can run thinner gauge wire, which Johnson said costs about a third less. “That savings per foot adds up very quickly.”
The socket design has been tested to withstand being plugged in and out at least 10,000 times. “We didn’t want that experience that everyone had when they plug in an outlet on an airplane or a hotel and it just goes out.” Johnson said.
Orange Charger sells Level 2-capable outlets for $750, not including installation, which Johnson says is the company’s “core product.” It also offers Level 1-enabled outlets for $600 and a Level 2 full-load charger for $2,000.
Each of Orange Charger’s products has a circuit board inside that serves as a hub in its mesh network, which can run over Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, and each outlet can still work if the internet connection goes down, sending any session data in the cloud once connectivity is restored. “Imagine not being able to charge for five hours because someone cut the wrong wire in our driveway,” Johnson said. “We wanted to build something that was robust.” So far, the company has managed to initiate more than 99% of all attempted charging sessions, he added.
Orange Charger bills owners based on energy consumption instead of the number of outlets installed. So far, the company has installed about 2,000 units nationwide.
“You have no downside to installing 50 outlets on day one,” Johnson said. “We only charge when the device is in use.” It’s an approach that might just solve a nagging chicken-and-egg problem that is delaying EV adoption.
