Liz Allan [00:00:00]:
So on today's podcast episode, I've got Oli Freeling-Wilkinson, and he is the CEO of Urban Fox Networks. Ollie Thank you ever so much for joining me today. I really appreciate it.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:00:12]:
Thanks for having me, Liz. Looking forward to to talking to you about all things Urban Fox
Liz Allan [00:00:17]:
Oh, can't wait. I can't wait. And we've already I've already had Randall, Randall, Tiny Smith, who's not tiny at all, on here, which and he he's just he was just so interested. So so I'm really looking forward to this because you are the linchpin of of Urban Fox in the first place, aren't you? So I'm gonna talk to you. I'm gonna just announce what you've done and give a little bit of a background to you. So so CEO of Urban Fox Network, co founder of Urban Electric Network, and that was started you founded that in 2017, didn't you?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:00:50]:
Correct.
Liz Allan [00:00:51]:
Yeah. You worked a lot in fintech. I could see that. And there's one thing that I'm really excited. I was really excited when I saw this on LinkedIn that you that you were originally erasing erasing driver that you did, and he did that for about 6 years. And I was like, what? So you've gotta give me some of you give me some background and tell me how how did you go from being an e a a race, not an EV racing driver, but a racing driver to where you are now.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:01:16]:
Yeah. You're right. I mean, I was I was racing cars for for much of my youth, incredible times. I was fortunate enough to have some success I was a British and European car champion, and I won various sort of scholarships in, in car racing, but there's a there's a saying in motor to make a 1,000,000, you gotta spend 2,000,000. And I had £2 50 in my back pocket. So, so I knew a career in motorsport probably, you know, wasn't wasn't gonna be for me. So, so that led me to working in the city briefly, at which ended up being a fintech business. where way back when we set it up, it was about using social media to try and find intelligence for for markets, for people who are trading or buying stocks and shares. And, I used to have a slide 10 years or so ago with explain what social media was and, it's everywhere now. So, I sold that business to a hedge fund, back in
Liz Allan [00:02:11]:
2016.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:02:13]:
and that led to me, with Keith Johnson, my cofounder founding Erbil Electric, back in 2017, really to solve a major problem, and that was, you know, providing near home charging for residents that don't have a driver or a garage as we know, you know, if you've got an electric vehicle today, as I do, you know, the chances are you have a driver, a garage to charge it conveniently at home, you know, and it's for all the inconvenience of people like to kind of bleach on about electric vehicles, that one piece makes them far more convenient than any ice vehicle. You know, you don't have to go to actual station because ultimately for 99% of your journeys, you know, you've got a charger at home, and there's no wait time. You know, you go to sleep or you watch Netflix or eat your dinner, but unfortunately, you know, as you as you may well know, 2 third, well, a third of the UK population roughly doesn't have access to that, and that's something that we went set out to solve
Liz Allan [00:03:05]:
Yeah. Exactly. So just explain. So so Urban Urban Fox Network, so you have have designed and manufactured or designed this this charge point. Just so you called it. We before we side recording, you called it a retractable curbside charge point, didn't you? Explain to people who haven't seen this because it's a piece of kit, and I'll I just think it look so sexy. Explain what it looks like. I sound a geek there, don't I?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:03:35]:
I'm -- No. No. Not at all. So for just the sake of clarity, urban fox, which is only a brand new company, only a couple of months old, which is a partnership between Balfour Beatty And Herbal Electric Networks. so that the charger itself was developed by a company co founded called Urban Electric Networks with Keith Johnston who was responsible for the Gee whiz. Some of you may remember from well over a decade ago. So he's been in the EV space, but for many years. We've also got Kabi Taylor Horr on the team at Urban Electric who set up arguably the world's first public charging network. I'm charging back office. So there was a load of experience. and, you know, way back then, even back then, it was clear that the places that needed electrification more than anywhere where our polluted urban areas. Yeah. and anecdotally, I had you know, I used to live in West London. I had neighbors who would tell me they were really interested in going electric, but the big reason why they wouldn't do it was lack of charging provision where they live That's because we all parked on street. So there was clearly anecdotally, you know, a problem to be solved, and that was backed up by all the data on a showing, you know, who was actually adopting electric vehicles, which is as true now as it was then, believe it or not, is people generally with a driver or a garage. And so, we said about, you know, for the 1st year of our existence, literally talking to local authorities or end users or anybody, who could be affected by the deployment of charging infrastructure on the streets where they live. And we spent a long time doing it because we wanted to really understand the pain points and the challenges from everyone's perspectives so we could factor that into to our business and our product development moving forwards. and this was to derisk the proposition because my previous business, I made all the mistakes that you can imagine here. We had a great technological idea but we didn't really test the the solution in the market anywhere near thoroughly enough. you know, and that was something that we were keen to learn from. I was keen to learn from with my next venture. which is urban Electric. So, you know, one of the key themes that kept coming back was around street clutter. You know, you think about leafy suburb streets, you know, and pavements, which are, you know, rightly for pedestrian use, having a proliferation of bollards wasn't really in the top of people's wish list, despite the fact we wanted to go electric. you know, and we could understand that, you know, we've seen with part meters, if you remember, they used to be everywhere, and they've been sort of slowly, you know, a bit surely they've disappeared from our street escape and for the better. as it's all kind of moves app based. so so we realized, you know, there was a problem. People didn't like the existing solutions out there. So we needed to come up with with an answer. and that led finally to what we see now, which is a UE 1 retractable curbside charger, but there's a whole story of why it is designed the way it is. Why is it retractable? Why is it not just a simple thing you plug in the ground? and I'm more than happy to kind of elaborate, why that that's the case.
Liz Allan [00:06:36]:
Please do. Please do. I'll I'd love to hear about this. Yeah.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:06:39]:
So So I guess, you know, where we started off with a design was something super simple, literally a socket in the ground. we thought, isn't that great? Just bend down plugging the ground. No moving parts. Let's do that. but but we very, very quickly realized that, you know, there were there were several challenges to that approach. One was around electrical safety, you know, having sockets at the ground level is is not desirable for obvious reasons, particularly in a rainy country like the UK.
Liz Allan [00:07:06]:
Oh my gosh. He mentioned.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:07:08]:
Yeah. And and actually, there were, you know, the the BS, the law, guidelines or brawls at the time stated a minimum socket height of 50 centimeters in the public domain. So we obviously took that very, very seriously. So it almost immediately ruled out something being in the ground. Yes. Then there was, you know, trip hazard risk as well, cause the lower you have something, particularly with trailing cables, the greater the risk of trip hazard to pedestrians And so the last thing we wanted to do was develop something even just the 50 centimeters because that's still quite low. That could be hit by by pedestrians. And so so again, that was another huge factor, safety. the final factor was around making a charge point accessible to everyone. we wanted to design a charge point where it didn't matter how old or young you were, how mobile or immobile you may be, you can still partake in the electric vehicle revolution plug in and charge. So again, that negated to anything that required bending down or do it push things into the ground, which is why the retractable curbside charger mean reverted to a bollard essentially that rose to a height that meant, you know, you didn't have to or you that rose to a accessible high limit. You could just plug it in and that's it. There's no interface on the charge point at all, by the way. You don't have to touch the charge point, do anything with it It's all app app operated at the moment. And soon, there'll be a contactless solution. So you'll have a contactless terminal that will do the same thing. You have to bend down, you plug in. And even when you unplug, you don't have to do anything. It will auto retract back into the ground. again, it just makes it accessible. So those are the real key drivers, you know, and it took years, by the way, to pick all of this. I'm kind of summarizing years of learnings into, like, a 5:5 minute sort of summary. but a lot of it was through trial and error, talking to users under selling what worked, what didn't work. You know, we were very keen to have a positive feedback loop into the development process. You know, any challenges not to kind of shy away from them, but to incorporate them to ensure we could come up with the best solution possible. and hence why we're super thrilled to be launching commercially this year, the UE 1 retractable curbside charge point through Urban Fox to provide the best solution for on street charging.
Liz Allan [00:09:24]:
I just think I I saw I saw it. and because I I kind of met Randall earlier on this year, but I saw it when when Randall was he had it, or you guys had it at fully charged live. And he talked about it, and I think I'd seen the video before I came, but he was actually seeing it. And also, you know, kind of just experiencing it. I just thought that was it was it kinda glided, you know, it kind of it did really, you know, it wasn't like one of those dodgy old lifts that you think of. You know what I mean? It just glided up and then backed down again. I just thought, that that in itself, it just looked really good. You know?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:10:10]:
Thank you. And it's
Liz Allan [00:10:11]:
-- Go on. Sorry.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:10:13]:
was gonna say, I mean, it's it's, you know, again, through trial and error, and, you know, you've got moving parts and different materials, kind of, and tolerances. And so again, you know, it's why it's taken so long come to market. We spent 5 or 6 years really testing that because everyone's mindset will be. It's got moving It's not gonna be reliable. It's not gonna work. And actually, from our pilots, we've had Innovate UK, the UK Innovation Agency backing us up until now, without their help. We wouldn't be where we are, so we are eternally grateful to them, and it's a fantastic program. But throughout all our pirates, we had pilots, I should say, not pirates. we had above average, above industry average uptime. You know, this is for prototypes that weren't necessarily perfect. And so we had
Liz Allan [00:10:55]:
99.4
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:10:56]:
percent uptime across trials in Dundee, Plymouth Stafford, amongst others. So know, we were and and this is in all weather conditions, like minus 10 degrees, you know, is snow and ice all the way up to 40 degree heat days. to really stress test this product, which is why Balfors were involved, you see. They they like to do their due diligence. They are, you know, known for being quite risk averse. and, ultimately, you know, all of this this factored into their decision to back, you know, what is now urban
Liz Allan [00:11:29]:
I mean, they they've been around for so many years, How you must have courted them for some time because you I can't imagine that being an overnight an overnight success you know, and like like you said stress stress testing, etcetera, etcetera. How how did Balfour Beat get involved? Cause I mean, this in itself is massive for for a young company like yourself, you know, all of yourself, should I say?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:11:59]:
Yeah. I mean, it was, I mean, we are absolutely thrilled to have Balfour Beatty.
Liz Allan [00:12:04]:
I was surprised.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:12:05]:
Yeah. Partnering with us through Balfour Beatty Investments who have committed 60,000,000 of of capital, with another loads more millions to come, you know, as we as we grow the business. So you know, for us, when we were looking to to commercialize our product, they're I guess it's fair to say that the sector as a whole is a is attracting investor interest.
Liz Allan [00:12:28]:
Yeah.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:12:29]:
Everyone can see it coming down the line. So, now for us, it was a question of, you know, do we do we we talked to all sorts of investors, and they all had their strengths and weaknesses. and the thing that attracted us to bow for BT was the the delivery aspect you know, there are a lot of investors who are financial investors, but actually what what we realized we needed when you're talking to local authorities to deliver a long term infrastructure project for, you know, many decades to come, not just the next few years, they wanna derisk that delivery project and so what they're looking for regards to technological solutions are a partner that is almost a safe pair of hands. Yeah. Balfour Beatty's are over a hundred years old. They've been delivering a multi £1,000,000,000 infrastructure projects for decades. and so I know he's gonna question why they did a deal with Balfour BT, you know, local authority. So for us, that was super, super important and something we recognized. That is almost as important as our unique solution. and and of course, with Balfour Beatty's backing could be that delivery partner aspect. You know, we know, we're about near home charging. So we are agnostic actually when it comes to the actual solution people plug into to charge. we're not here to shoehorn a local authority down us, you know, down the retractable curbside charging, route if it doesn't make sense, you know, for us, it's about making sure we pick the right locations, for the right use case and install the right solution, to ensure the network is sustainable for the long term and serves the needs of of the communities, in the way that we hope. So so there's a huge amount of benefit with with Balfa being being a partner of ours, and we're starting to see the fruits of that now.
Liz Allan [00:14:15]:
I think it's amazing that you've got the, like I say, that you've got this far just talk talk about some of the pilots that you've run. So you've run pilots in Oxford, Dundee, Plymouth, and staff at you, haven't you? And I know you just said it innovate innovate UK back then. So so how how did that how many charge points were you putting in And how long was the pilot?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:14:39]:
So Oxford was our very 1st pilot way back in
Liz Allan [00:14:42]:
2018, 19.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:14:45]:
And it was where we literally started the project with a blank sheet of paper and then installed some charges on a on a typical residential street in Oxford, and and prove the concept. and from that, we we were able to secure further funding for a minute. That was in a UK and it was a relatively short term project in terms of live operation 6 months to give us some learnings to to take to to future project development. we were fortunate enough to win further innovate UK backing to the tune of roughly £5,000,000,000 to do an extensive pilot across Dundee and Plymouth City Councils just geographically far away as almost possible.
Liz Allan [00:15:23]:
Oh my gosh. Yeah. Of course.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:15:25]:
But both in different environments, quite harsh. you know, see, you know, close to the sea environment. So, you know, and those those pilots went on for over a year. We we've still got charges, believe it or not, in Dundee albeit, you know, very early prototypes that are still operating in a couple of sites in Dundee, and they they've been in there since the the the autumn of 2020. and so they were never designed to be in the ground that long, but you know, but we are gonna be replacing them soon with production units. So so we had amazing learnings and an experience that most people. Most companies bringing a new product to market never get where you get to test in a real life environment over an extensive period of time a product in all kinds of weather conditions and with all kinds of users before you actually commit to going to commercial production. and that was apt absolutely invaluable, you know, and and the the the products that we started with, I think we share less than 1% of the components with our production unit moving forward such as the extent of learning, throughout these trials. and and it was it's just been fantastic for us. I must say that the the pilot within staffordshire was via Amy and and a project called simulate. Okay. And it was in a slightly different use case it was using a public library car park for for for charging needs, for a local housing, estate.
Liz Allan [00:16:51]:
And
Oli Freeling-Wilkson [00:16:52]:
again, that was super, super successful. but yeah, and that trial lasted 6 months as well. And actually it was out through the hottest days of the year, which was, which was interesting.
Liz Allan [00:17:03]:
but at least she didn't have seaside and kind of all that all that kind of the weather that comes with the seaside sort of like ex be, you know, town to kinda deal with Instructure, would you?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:17:14]:
And again, this is all about derisking the proposition. You know, we can now go to local authorities, albeit with even with early of our unit to say we've had incredible, reliability and uptime. And and I think one of the most important things that we, as ChargePoint, operators need to ensure to to help the electrification journey for everybody is a is a reliable network you know, we don't want to be going back to the days of turning up to charge point so they don't work or whatever it is or hard to access. So you need, you haven't got the right cable or card, whatever it may be, you know, we wanna move away from that and make it as easy and reliable as possible.
Liz Allan [00:17:53]:
I totally get you because and I always say this to everybody, there's kind of this there's just this negative press out at the moment about the charging infrastructure isn't there. And I think it's some right. Some areas are fair.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:18:06]:
Absolutely. Yep.
Liz Allan [00:18:07]:
But some are very unfair and the fact that they don't recognize what's going into the the infrastructure itself and how it's evolving. Of course, you know, like you said, over time, you're gonna have kind of like, you know, early, early charge points and you, you know, I'm not saying this is not not you guys, But they're gonna be replaced and and and it's it's literally gonna just get better and better and better, isn't it?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:18:35]:
Absolutely. And the and the thing is we know it's a fast moving you know, industry. There's a lot of innovation and change. And in fact, you know, I'm glad you did bring it up and, you know, he said not you guys, but but we we don't rest on our laurels. You know, the whole one really interesting aspect of our design is that we don't cement the charge points in the ground like a normal charge point. We actually have like a box that's cemented in the ground, and the charge point just slots in. and that gives us a huge benefit. We call it our plug and play installation system. because one, if there is a catastrophic carrier with a charge point, you can literally replace it in 30 minutes. there's none of this having a damage charge point that needs to be dug out the ground for weeks on end. but also it means it it leaves room for innovation. So you know, it's completely modular and designed. So there may be vehicle to grid. There may be, I don't know, wireless charging that that that also becomes adopted in what we've tried to do is ensure that any technical innovation that gets thrown our way, we're able to adapt with minimal disruption to residents and pedestrians. even to the extent where we can install the provision for charges down the road, put in a couple of charges now, and as demand dictates literally dropping a new charger in 30 minutes. People if the demand goes through the roof, we can start to increase provision. and sustainably so as well again, because we're not digging up the roads again. We've done it all up front. We're using a sustainable power supply, the low voltage network, which is really important in our delivery model for near home charging. You know, there's always talk about speed and power and which is relatively valid for en route journeys. I know about you and I've been en route journeys and electric vehicles. Sometimes I get an alert on my phone to tell me I need to get back to my car before I've even buying my sandwich or going to the toilet or grabbing my coffee. just just not enough of it. but when it comes to near home charging or charging whilst you sleep, that is the fastest way to charge. You don't have to wait for it, you know, and that's something that I think everybody wants to see more of, you know, where you don't have to think about it a wait time just plug in where you your car is parked most of the time, and that's overnight at home.
Liz Allan [00:20:45]:
It's true. I mean, so so I would say this. Everybody'd be like, everybody who listens regularly, they're gonna gonna gonna say, oh, god. She off about it again. So we don't have an EV at the moment. This is why I started the public in the first place. Now this is the reason I started it, but what we do have is so we've got solar panels and a battery, and we have a charge point at home.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:21:07]:
Oh, brilliant.
Liz Allan [00:21:08]:
We've just gotta wait until our son passes his driving test. Hopefully, god, hopefully, fingers crossed next month and month. He doesn't enjoy driving, though. So it wouldn't have been, yeah, it wouldn't have been in your gang going on, you know, driving, driving, you know, racing driver. But, But, yeah, so we've we've had to hold off until until he passes his test. And because we're we're driving a manual. And if he that if he passes in an EV because the other thing is reading reading at the moment as all our driving tests, you know, examiners are view and far between there's 2 in the whole of Reading. Oh, wow. So he's actually having to take it funnily enough. He's actually having to take it in Oxford.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:21:52]:
Okay. Seems a bit more chaotic in Oxford to me knowing the the traffic in Oxford.
Liz Allan [00:21:57]:
Well, well, I think it's probably gonna be around the kind of the ring road and some of that kind of stuff, but I'm gonna have
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:22:02]:
to I wish him well.
Liz Allan [00:22:04]:
Thanks. Yeah. Yeah. That's gonna be great. Is that yeah. But honestly, Red Redding's I don't know whether you know Redding very much. It is it can be pretty awful.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:22:11]:
Oh, really? Okay.
Liz Allan [00:22:13]:
Yeah. Yeah.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:22:13]:
Well, good luck. And honestly, I wish him all the best. It's, you know, and hopefully it means that you can accelerate your electrification journey sooner rather than later.
Liz Allan [00:22:21]:
Well, exactly. Cause we've got these charge points out there, and I feel like I need to do something. So I might contact Joel from co charger and just see if we can I don't I'm not quite sure whether I want somebody rocking up on our drive to just charge though, you know.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:22:32]:
It's a great initiative. Yeah. And absolutely, it's I I I think again, you know, we're charging. There's so much innovation and services and new things coming and that there is a space for everybody and and everything. And, The co charger, philosophy is is
Liz Allan [00:22:48]:
definitely an interesting one
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:22:48]:
for sure, one that should you feel ready to have somebody rock up on your drive? at least you've got the option to do so.
Liz Allan [00:22:57]:
Exactly. So what we might do in the meantime, we might we've got co wheels, which is run by us. And there's and there's not many cars, but what I mean that might do is we because we've got the cars going in for a a a Campbell, which we won't have any of this malarkey, will we, in future? but it's got a can belt re been replaced because it's at its 5 years. And, and I'm I've said to my husband, maybe we'll kinda get co wheels and maybe try out the charge point ourselves because he's just sat there and I keep looking at it and going, oh.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:23:23]:
That's a great way to do it. Cobas were a partner of ours in in in a Dundee pilot as well. So
Liz Allan [00:23:28]:
Oh, right.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:23:29]:
Again, you know, a way to kind of democratize electrification because not electric cars are expensive. secondhand market is starting to to get a bit better, but there's still there's still a premium. and so you know, we we were keen to sort of work with car sharing clubs to to ensure that those that want to, you know, don't necessarily wanna own a vehicle. whether it's for financial reasons or just they don't need a car, but often, you know, we can we can help with that journey as well. So and there's nothing more convenient, is there? If you knew that there was a car share at the end of your road, you probably might ditch your car if you don't do too many journeys in it. And, you know, something that we're all for as well.
Liz Allan [00:24:09]:
Yeah. I've heard I've heard people talking about buying an EV between a few people as well. Do you know what I mean? So they're doing their own car sharing? And actually, some of those those models kind of, you know, they're only local, but actually it sounds like a really, really good idea because you're you are you are kind of splitting that cost between a number of people, aren't you?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:24:32]:
Absolutely. Yeah. And and from my perspective as a ChargePoint operator, we'd, you know, we're we kind of account, intuitively, don't mind there being less cars on the road. as long as they're more utilized, you know, you can imagine in London, Most people leave their cars just parked on the street whilst they hop on because they there's other they have they have other means to get from a to b, whether the tube or the train or the bus, you know, they're very, very well served. So, you know, the the less of those parks on the street, and if there were just a couple of car sharing ones at the end of the street, that are used more often, we're all for that as well, in particularly in urban areas. So, yeah, it's something that we're really keen just to keep, keeps sort of looking at and exploring and talking to various partners about.
Liz Allan [00:25:13]:
Yeah. I think it's I think it's a really, really good option. Just going back to the council's, though. Yep. So so the funding that councils get. So you've got Levi Levi funding, and you've got Orcs funding that comes that comes from central government, doesn't it? Yeah. And but then then people talk about kind of fully fully funded solutions coming from the charge point operators when in relation to local authorities. So so ex can you ex explain how how that that bit works. How does a how does a a fully funded solution from a ChargePoint operator work compared to Levi. How do they all kind of fit together?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:25:55]:
So fully funded solutions are
Liz Allan [00:25:56]:
where that charge fund operator
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:25:56]:
will literally pay for everything. thing, you know, the the installation, operation, maintenance of charging infrastructure for however long an agreement is, typically quite long term. 10, 15, 20 years. it's more typical in the rapid charging space because it's a relatively more straightforward business case. more challenging in where we are at, which is near home or on streets. and I think this from and forgive me if I'm wrong. I think we're probably one of only 2 Chargeprint operators in the on street space that can actually offer a fully funded solution to local authorities for on street charging. so the way you attract your invest, you know, the investment will always look at, you know, can we make a return and and, you know, how long does it take? and typically at this point of EV adoption, it's a very expensive exercise, you know, to install these units and to operate and maintain them. And you're probably not looking for any kind of payback for anything from 7 to 10 years, which is why there are long term agreements of local authorities in place to to facilitate that. But first and but first and foremost, it starts with can we make it work privately, you know, based on x contract terms. And then when the government funding is there, it's almost like a like a bonus, you know, you don't have to use it, for
Liz Allan [00:27:16]:
1.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:27:16]:
But, 2, if you do use it, you know, it's it's something that maybe, you know, you work with the Chargebee operator to do it in a strategic way. maybe areas where, you know, there there there there there there there there are there aren't many vehicles, and there's a there's a political reason why Charge point should be in a certain area or whatever it may be, and that's where that funding works really, really well, I think. But ultimately, we can work with it, as can any other charge point operator because our standing point is that we have to pay for everything anyway. Now I think the important thing from a local authorities perspective is This funding pot is here now, but I think as is becoming more and more apparent, and I don't wanna sort of talk out a turn here is that could well be it. in terms of funding from central government for charging infrastructure in the UK. And so local authorities now need to be thinking Who am I gonna be partnering with? So whether it's to leverage its near term funding or not, but who can I partner with now that can not only exploit that near term funding, but also be with me as a partner for the long term to continue the growth of the network? Yeah. cause, you know, the unfortunate consequence of government funding is you get a splurge of cash, you know, it has to be spent by a certain time.
Liz Allan [00:28:33]:
Yes.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:28:33]:
So you get a boom and bust. and it's, and there's often not a huge amount of strategic thinking behind it, not in all cases, but in some cases that is very much the the the definitely the definitely true. So and what we're trying to say to locals is is look, you need to be let let's just take a step back and be a bit more strategic about this because ultimately, you don't want to boom and bust where you hire people and then say, right, that's it now. We've installed a 100 charge points and, you know, we'll contact you the next time we need to install charges. What you need to do is come up with a long term delivery plan to say, well, what do we need to full electrification. And these things will change. Don't get me wrong. What do you need in the next 5 years? What does that mean on a month by month basis? And then then becomes much more sustainable. It means it's it's a it's a more gradual network growth just ahead of demand. It means that there's sustainable employment opportunities. It's not boom and bust. You kind of in you're talking to a civil contractor and saying, right, this is the next 5 years' worth of work. and you know you'll be installing x amount of charges every month for the next x x years. and so these are things that we're trying to talk to local authorities about now. Now keep in mind we're only a couple of months old, so we've got a lot of a lot of work to do. and there was a splash for, you know, dash for cash as it were at the moment, but but but it it needed the gate a more strategic approach and it'll be for the benefit of everybody if we can just just do that now rather than think about it later.
Liz Allan [00:30:01]:
No. I mean, like you say, the long term approach, it's kind of the it's it's it's kind of a hand holding approach in a way, isn't it? Or but it but it's it actually, no, not hand holding. It's the collaborative approach.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:30:16]:
Partnership, totally.
Liz Allan [00:30:17]:
Yeah.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:30:18]:
Yeah. It shouldn't be a them and us. It's, you know, we're in this together. you know, from our perspective, we're taking a huge amount of financial risk and bringing a lot of investment into an area. So it's in our interests as much as anybody's that this works. you know, the last thing you want to do is over install charges as well. because that can also have a negative effect for the community because in a particular, if you're trying to carve out charging bays, you know, there's parking pressures, you know, it it can and there's lots of disruption with that. You you you kind of want it to be gradual and bring the communities along with you in a way that that that appeases everybody that this can affect whether you're an EV driver or not or anti car or not.
Liz Allan [00:31:01]:
Yeah. I think that that moving forward together, I mean, I suppose when we talk about local authorities, How how easy is it for them to make those decisions?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:31:15]:
Yeah. Not easy at all. as you can imagine I
Liz Allan [00:31:18]:
know that's a bad question to us.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:31:20]:
Yeah. I know. But but it's valid. You know, I know Ozev, you know, Office of 0 emission vehicles are trying to address this. you know, by coming up with a bit more kind of centralized thinking, to help local authorities as they plan for an electric future. But ultimately, every local authority is different. You almost get to look at them as different countries in many ways.
Liz Allan [00:31:41]:
They will
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:31:41]:
have different ways of thinking about this this problem to solve and how they might benefit from it, how they, you know, how they might want to generate revenue from it or not, how they might want to serve the communities, you know, what what their skin in the game may or may not be all the way through to how they feel about contractual arrangements to make it happen. and how comfortable they are with longer term agreements or not. And and not only that, that it's different different individuals in different departments sort of calling the shots across different local authorities. So so it it, you know, it's it's starting to change. the great thing with the LEAFI fund is it does provide funding for resource at local authorities to actually bring in resource to to to kind of make this a bit more joined up. but but it's it is a very difficult place for them right now, and we understand that they're under resource effectively. And this is where we can help. You know, 1st and foremost, we wanna be a trusted advisor. and this is why we don't try and suggest, look, you must use our solution every time. It's kind of just tried to take a step back and come down with a top down view of what we think the community needs for the next x years and ensuring that we do the right thing by the community. And that that's number 1, and we think that that will feed through to to our delivery model and the way we wanna do things in a sustainable way. So but there's a lot. There's a lot of work to be done still. you know, anybody involved dealing with local authorities as a CPA will will tell you the same thing.
Liz Allan [00:33:14]:
Yeah. I can I I do I do hear this a lot from from, you know, across the sector, you can see it on social media. You to various people. And I know, local authorities and central government, it's it's a machine, isn't it? And it and it takes it takes a while for things to move forward. It's a bit it's a bit like kind of, I don't did you do you remember the, the container ship that got stuck in the Suez Canal?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:33:40]:
Yes.
Liz Allan [00:33:41]:
It kind of reminds me a bit of that, really.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:33:44]:
It is, you know, and, yeah, you know, ultimately, local authorities aren't aren't gonna be quick to move. and even when you have champions or people that wanna move quickly, you know, they're working with other departments and whatever it will procurement. Procurement is an issue, in terms of making that more streamlined because it is a painful process for local authorities. And, unfortunately, a lot of the framework are almost widgets contracts, for want of a better phrase,
Liz Allan [00:34:10]:
you know,
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:34:10]:
where you kind of buy nuts and bolts, but you're not here. You know, this is very different. This is a service you know, in in many ways now, it is it is being funded by the private sector. So we need to kind of have new thinking about how we should approach this in a more efficient way. And these conversations are occurring, at a local government as well as central government level, but but it but it will take time to filter through, but we're confident, particularly the likes of Charge UK now coming into fruition and the new industry body for Chargebee operators. And these are all private chargement operators, most of them can offer fully funded solutions. So we're all kind of singing off the same hymn sheet when it comes to the message that we wanna get across.
Liz Allan [00:34:50]:
Yeah. I like I like the fact that Charge UK is now in play in this in this situation because because actually that is that is a way to kind of regulate internally rather than regulate from external in, isn't it? And it's always the better way to do it. actually by looking at those best practice methods internally rather
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:35:14]:
than
Liz Allan [00:35:15]:
somebody kind of regulating you externally to force you into something. You know? So
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:35:23]:
Yeah. And you you've seen the fruits of it with, you know, the accessibility of charging is so, so important, but one rule, you know, one regulation that was looking to be brought in was contactless for for fast charges or 7 kilowatt charges. and that was changed because of charge UK saying that this would actually create a lot of cost for the end user. When we're trying to take away cost and and normalize pricing or bring or bring it closer tone to those that have a drive and those that don't, but you're introducing more costs into those that don't have a drive. So it means that the the the pricing gets further and further away when ultimately, we want to bring them closer together. and so that was an example of charge UK having a having a, you know, influence quite early on
Liz Allan [00:36:08]:
And that's brilliant because that's what you need, isn't it? You really need this. It's gonna make make such such a difference to to to you know, to the industry in the sector and the end user because when we come when it comes down to it, we want people to use these things, don't we?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:36:24]:
Absolutely. You know? And, you know, we're all for better user experience and, you know, don't get me wrong, but it also there is a cost element. Ultimately, people are price sensitive. And, you know, we do, we do need to just think about that. you know, one thing I will say though, you often get very, very headline numbers. So when it costs me
Liz Allan [00:36:45]:
£30
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:36:46]:
a kilowatt hour to charge at home versus £50 and a public network per se, And, you know, one thing we're keen to kind of start unpicking a bit is that's not really apples with apples because the public charging network also takes into account the CapEx element, the op, yeah, operating costs. Yeah. Whereas people kind with the home charger rate forget about the costs of that home charger. to install it and to maybe replace it every 3, 4, 5 years, and how that factors into actually the true kilowatt hour price that they pay, and people would be surprised if it's actually a lot closer than they think. you know, because you imagine going to a public charging point of having to fork out a £1000 before we could even start charging?
Liz Allan [00:37:29]:
Oh my gosh.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:37:29]:
Yeah. But this is what people do for home charging me. They kinda omit that cost from -- Yeah.
Liz Allan [00:37:33]:
Yeah. Yeah. --
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:37:33]:
the kilowatt hour price. So -- Hi. So we've got a bit of education to do to kind of say, look, it isn't as bad as you think. I mean, it's don't get me wrong. There needs to be a margin, but, ultimately, it's not as wide as people probably think at first.
Liz Allan [00:37:47]:
And, actually, move moving from an ice vehicle over to an EV anyway. Look at, you know, I'm I'm probably spending I can't remember how much we're filling up Polytech's cost me £70, and I'm probably filling up possibly twice a month. So, you know, we're talking about a £140 a month.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:38:08]:
Wow. Yeah.
Liz Allan [00:38:09]:
Just to fill an ice vehicle up. Do you know what I mean? So so, actually, the cost to charge. And, look, like I said, luckily, we've got our the home charge point ready for it. With the
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:38:19]:
solar as well. So you'll be
Liz Allan [00:38:21]:
-- And the solar. --
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:38:22]:
charging off the sun. be great.
Liz Allan [00:38:24]:
Exactly. Exactly. You know, so so that that is is is brilliant. And and I can't see us having to use en route charging too often. So so people have to, but have to look at, you know, how often if you if you haven't got a driveway, then that's very different. I tow I totally get that, but it's it's people understanding all of this. And I keep I keep saying, you know, we to kind of to reduce the amount of negativity that we've got out there about the charging infrastructure and EVs, etcetera. There's gotta be a level of We've got a shout louder than the negative the negative Nellies. Do you know what I mean?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:39:03]:
You know? Absolutely. And actually, you know, I've taken my electric car to France just the other week, absolute doddle. It was absolutely fine. You know? I took did this I did the same journey a few years ago, and it was much more difficult. And it just goes to show how the infrastructure is improving. you know, we do need to sort of bang bang the drum a bit. And en route is so important. You know, it's not It shouldn't be the primary charging zapping as much energy out of the grid as possible in, you know, as quickly as possible, but it's so vital to to those extended journeys. And you know, up until now, you don't want to turn up to a service station and find there's only one charger there and somebody's using it. There's a queue of three people and know, they've got to be banks of these things and it's starting to happen. I was pleasantly surprised by what I saw at exit to services the other day, with the work grid service doing, you know, banks of Tesla charges as well as, you know, typical rapids that that could service all other EVs as well. And it it's brilliant. It's definitely the future in terms of en route and we need more of that. So, there's a lot lots going on, and there is a place for all kinds of charging solution. I'm say, you know, in in the EV space, you know, there's a lot of innovation going on. But one thing I should say, if it is a if we are coming towards an end of this is the technological risk that people see. I always try and pair it back to, you know, well, ultimately a public charging network needs to service the community. And the community includes people who are rich and poor, the haves, and the have nots. And so don't I always try say to lack of authority, don't be seduced by, by the worry that wireless charging may come online or whatever it may be because ultimately in 15 or 20 years' time, you'll have low income households buying a 4th or 5th hand nis Nissan Leafs or Tesla Model 3 because there's so many on the road at the moment.
Liz Allan [00:40:55]:
who will need
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:40:56]:
to charge in the public domain, and they have the humble socket and cable, you know, and, you know, whatever happens in 20 years' time, you will still see the humble sockets and cable everywhere because ultimately this electrification journey needs to include everybody. you know, and, not those with a late and greatest. so they're great for the headlines, great for, you know, trying to convert those that may be skeptical, but ultimately infrastructure needs to work for everybody.
Liz Allan [00:41:25]:
I love that. I love that. That's yeah. You're right. That's just it's so true. It does have to work for everybody. And like you say, you know, not everybody has a brand new mobile phone. Not everybody has a brand new laptop. not everybody has a brand new car set on their drive, you know, currently an ice car even, there are, you know, people, it's gonna take years and it's gonna start coming trickling down, isn't it? So so yeah, good good for you, Ollie. That's that's an excellent way of of of actually finishing I I do wanna ask before we've, well, before we've properly finished though. If people want to contact you or or Urban Fox, Where's the best place to find you? So you've got your website, haven't you?
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:42:14]:
We do. Yeah. Which is fox.network. so that is probably the best place. And we have a contact us form there at the moment. It got my personal email on there as well. People want to, email me personally. Luckily, I've not had that much spam yet, so it's all good. yeah, by all means, do reach out to me personally if you have any questions, you know, we are just starting on our journey. As I say, we're only a couple of months old. you know, we're always receptive to the public saying, look, gonna talk to our local authority about what you guys are doing, and we think they should be made aware. It always sounds better coming from you guys than it does from me. So, you know, we're we're, you know, we're we're an open door right now and any suggestions that you have, anything that you like and things that you don't like about charging networks at the moment. You know, we we've got a great opportunity as a young business to to all that learning in to ensure that we can build something bigger and better. so that's that's something that we're really keen to hear from you about as well.
Liz Allan [00:43:11]:
Oh, that's brilliant. Honestly, and and so so you're you're also on LinkedIn as well. I know you're you're kind of I know Randall's always quite Randall
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:43:20]:
is very vocal on LinkedIn. He like our LinkedIn guru. I I must profess. I'm not the biggest social media user, but, I I do appreciate it. It's super important. But, yeah, I'm on LinkedIn. My email's on the website. If you see anything about Fox on LinkedIn. It's probably from Randall, so feel free to reach out to him as well.
Liz Allan [00:43:39]:
It will be. No. So you're also on on Twitter and Instagram, but that probably be building over time anyway. But Absolutely. Yeah. But listen, this is is just been such a pleasure talking to you. I've really, really enjoyed it. You've been such a refreshing that that your outlook on all of this is so refreshing. It's it's fabulous, honestly. And and absolutely and know everybody who's been listening and watching will have really appreciated this, the, you know, the the way that you've spoken about all of this, the way that I have. So thank you ever so much, Holly, for your time.
Oli Freeling-Wilkinson [00:44:16]:
Thank you, Liz. I really, really appreciate you having us, and and good luck with the podcast. We'll definitely promote it
Liz Allan [00:44:21]:
Hey. Thank you very much. Thank you. And listen to everybody else, I'm gonna say, I'm gonna see you next time. I hope you've enjoyed all of this. and goodbye for now. See you next time. Bye.