YKC Clean Energy Technologies (YKC Charging), a leading Chinese provider of EV charging and energy management services, has recently announced the completion of its Series B3 financing with investment from top smart device manufacturer OPPO, concluding three significant financing rounds within a space of just nine months following investments from CATL and NIO Capital.
YKC Charging is one of the pioneers in the Chinese EV charging sector and one of the few Chinese internet firms with both technical expertise and an open attitude towards collaboration with other industry players. Since 2016, YKC Charging has built the largest third-party EV charging SaaS platform in China. By October 2021, YKC Charging was serving some 2,800 charging station operators while the number of directly connected charging piles topped 140,000, leading the way in the industry in terms of both scale and strength.
YKC Charging has been on a mission with a focus on EV charging and on energy management with the end goal of becoming an integrated energy management service provider with a deep commitment to the charging infrastructure sector through collaboration with industry partners. To this end, the firm, in cooperation with local governments and companies across the industry chain, has established the first carbon peak and neutrality-oriented fund in the sector while creating industry-leading products and services with applications in the software, finance, energy storage and carbon trading sectors, as well as providing operations and maintenance services through cooperation with upstream and downstream vendors. This recent investment demonstrates OPPO's high recognition of YKC Charging's well-defined strategies, cooperation philosophy and efforts in helping achieve carbon peak and neutrality goals.
Notably, YKC Charging had completed several rounds of strategic financing before the Series B3 financing. Investors included leading logistics provider GLP, battery giant CATL and NIO Capital. These investments served to bring together several key elements, including charging scenarios, technologies for charging equipment, traffic sources and industry capital. According to available information, OPPO has successively rolled out several smart mobility solutions since the beginning of the year. In response to the country's carbon peak and neutrality goals, the smartphone manufacturer chose to invest in and establish a strong alliance with YKC Charging to create synergies by leveraging their respective advantages. OPPO plans to work in concert with YKC Charging to further the integration of in-vehicle infotainment (IVI) and connected charging piles. The collaboration between the two companies is expected to facilitate innovation across the sector by leveraging their respective competencies in technologies, ultimately opening up more opportunities to themselves and other industry players.
About YKC Charging
Established in 2016, YKC Clean Energy Technologies (YKC Charging), a leading Chinese provider of EV charging and energy management services, has built the largest third-party charging IoT SaaS platform in China, with business spanning over 320 cities and serving more than 2,800 charging pile operators. Based on an open third-party platform cooperation ecosystem, YKC Charging provides comprehensive SaaS-based charging solutions to charging station operators, easy-to-use and efficient integrated charging management solutions to fleets and logistics providers, and scenarios-based charging-related operational and software services to government agencies and corporate customers. In October 2021, the firm established the first fund in the charging infrastructure sector to focus on carbon peak and carbon neutrality in concert with local governments and companies across the industry chain, intending to create the country's largest charging network for logistics and public services while actively investing in and building storage-charging integrated charging stations.
YKC Clean Energy Technologies (YKC Charging)