EV startup Esmito raises Rs 10Cr in a seed round led by Unicorn India Ventures

IIT Madras incubated EV startup Esmito, a battery swapping solutions provider working with OEMs and last-mile delivery players to enable energy as a service, has raised Rs 10 crore in a seed funding round led by Unicorn India Ventures.

Founded in 2018 by Prabhjot Kaur, Hasan Ali and Akhila Vijay Kumar, the startup intends to use the raised capital to expand swapping solutions and further strengthening the technology team to bring out world-class products.

Esmito offers swapping solutions and energy as a service to logistics and last-mile mobility players that includes products integrated with web & mobile applications and embedded analytical modules.

It aims to deepen its differentiation in swapping even though the swapping solutions industry is at a nascent stage. The funding will also help the startup to continue executing its growth strategy and strengthen its position as the largest swapping infra solutions provider.

Esmito said it aims to build multiple use cases in key segments like Logistics & MAAS (Mobility as a Service).

"Esmito is rightly positioned in a rapidly growing and fast evolving EV market. Based on our strengths in building scalable swapping technology, we believe that Esmito can unlock immense value for the end user thereby accelerating the adoption of EVs in the country. The booming battery swapping market coupled with Esmito’s strength of in-house technology capability can enable Esmito to lead the Energy/ Battery as a Service market," said Hasan Ali, Co-founder of Esmito.

Esmito said it has built multiple EV technologies with the Centre for Battery Engineering and Electric Vehicles (CBEEV) and has been instrumental in shaping standardization and policy alignments for the larger adoption of swapping in the country.

It has also launched smart battery swap solutions for mobility service providers and aims to build and scale further its swapping solutions for India's two and three-wheeler market.

Speaking on the investment, Sparsh Kumar, Vice President, Unicorn India Ventures, said, "The Indian EV market is evolving rapidly and the Government has been at the forefront of framing policies related to EV adoption, battery standardization and swapping in India. The EV industry, according to various estimates, is projected to see anywhere between 30-90% CAGR, sustained through this decade and possibly even beyond."

"This roughly translates into EV sales overtaking ICE vehicle sales by mid-to-late 2030s with India becoming the 3^rd largest EV market. Combined with the fact that this adoption is going to be much faster in the commercial 2W and 3W categories which Esmito aims to serve, we think that there is a lot of potential of rapid value creation in this space," Sparsh said.

Esmito said it collects data from all sub-systems and performs intelligent data analytics across all the solutions which assist in EV asset optimization, inventory control, charging demand forecasts and driving patterns.

The platform also generates insightful reports for charger usage, battery and cell life analytics, vehicle performance, driving behaviour, and user transactions, it said.

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