Bechtle, Kreor, and The Mobility House are building one of Germany’s largest charging parks for electric company cars

November 26, 2020|Munich

  • The Mobility House is now supplying suitable charging infrastructure for the IT company Bechtle’s fleet of electric company cars.
  • The technology company is also providing the entire range of services of its hardware-agnostic Charging and Energy Management system ChargePilot®.
  • The project management was provided by the planning office Kreor Südwest.
  • The electrification of additional Bechtle sites in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland is already in full swing.
Charging station Bechtle

The IT company Bechtle has set up one of Germany’s largest charging parks for company cars at one of its company sites: up to 140 electric cars can now be charged simultaneously at the head office in Neckarsulm. The technology company The Mobility House is providing suitable intelligent charging infrastructure for the new charging points (up to 78) and, with the Charging and Energy Management system ChargePilot®, it is ensuring that the numerous charging processes are incorporated into the existing energy landscape efficiently and inexpensively.

ChargePilot® performs the monitoring, surveillance, evaluation, and dynamic load management of the electric car charging points that are located in the employee parking garage at Bechtle Platz 1 in Neckarsulm. Depending on power availability, the electric cars charge particularly quickly with up to 22 kW or—whenever major consumers are started up, such as stoves and ovens in the company restaurant or the air-conditioning system in summer—briefly at a slightly slower speed or in sequential phases. The system receives the information from the site’s existing energy management system via an open interface.

All new charging stations already meet the Federal Government’s requirements for subsidies, and they are also in accordance with calibration laws and thus already prepared for billing of the charging processes for external users. A billing module can be added at any later date as desired by the customer in a hardware-agnostic way, as can other modules and charging stations.

"As fleet sizes increase, the capacity of the existing mains connection is challenged and the costs for connection and usage can quickly begin to spiral. Another important factor is having open interfaces to third-party systems such as energy management and fleet management systems for optimum electric operation of the fleet. We are delighted to be able to present the perfect solution for this with ChargePilot®."

Sebastian Karrer,

Head of Key Account, The Mobility House

With the number of charging points now totaling 140, Bechtle is increasing the electric charging infrastructure at the Neckarsulm site to more than double. The next steps have already been planned. They show that Germany’s largest system house is taking the expansion of electric mobility seriously.

"Our mid-term goal is to electrify the roughly 70 sites in Germany. It was important for us to work with a partner that would give us as much flexibility as possible, as the conditions on-site naturally differ from one place to the next. With The Mobility House, we have found exactly what we were looking for in a solution provider."

Uli Drautz,

authorized Bechtle representative and responsible for group controlling, Bechtle

At all sites where implementation is possible, charging infrastructure from The Mobility House will be used along with ChargePilot® and the dynamic load management. Further charging points are also planned at sites in Austria and Switzerland. 

This will make it possible to charge the constantly growing fleet of electric cars reliably and inexpensively. By the end of 2020, approximately 15% of the roughly 3,600 company cars in Germany will be electrified, as either plug-in hybrids or purely electric vehicles. Bechtle is thus exceeding the target set in the 2019 sustainability report of 10%. The new Volkswagen ID.3 (which is set to launch a new era for VW, following in the footsteps of the Beetle and the Golf) in particular will be a more common sight at Bechtle. A total of 50 ID.3s have been added to the company car fleet. The Mobility House is also collaborating with Volkswagen and the VW subsidiary Elli.

The project management is performed by the planning office Kreor Südwest, a company that Bechtle has already been working with for years.

"Setting up the charging infrastructure for Bechtle AG in Neckarsulm is an exciting project for us. The implementation will cover all sites in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland in addition to the expansion of the Group headquarters."

Bernd Dollmann,

Managing Director, Kreor Südwest GmbH