Charging networks are changing hands. Companies that ran out of runway are being bought, parent companies are selling the parts they no longer want to run, and operators are combining networks to reach scale. Sooner or later every operator ends up on one side of a deal: buying, selling or merging.
Johan van Kooten, AMPECO’s Strategic Business Development Director Europe, described the moment at the AMPECO masterclass at ICNC26 in Berlin in September 2026: “Our industry is growing up. We’re moving from early adopters to the early majority, and that transition is unforgiving.” Consolidation is where that transition shows first.
Whichever side of a deal you’re on, your charging platform will help it move or hold it back. For a buyer, it decides how fast an acquired network runs as part of one business. For a seller, it decides whether due diligence counts the platform as an asset or prices it in as a liability.
Three kinds of consolidation deal
Most deals in EV charging fall into one of three kinds. Each starts from a different place and asks something different of the software.
Distress: when the money runs out first
Building a charging network takes years of investment before utilisation catches up with it. When funding runs out before that point, the network is sold, often through administration and often on a short timeline set by the administrators rather than by the business.
For the software, this is a test of continuity. Drivers still expect their app to work and their cards to be accepted, site hosts still expect to be paid, and charge points still need to be monitored, all while ownership moves. The buyer has to take over customer accounts, tariffs, roaming agreements and the charge points themselves quickly, without a gap in service that drivers would notice.
Pod’s acquisition of EO Charging in May 2026 followed this path, a few weeks after EO went into administration.
Refocusing: keeping the core, selling the rest
Large groups that built or bought charging businesses across several markets and segments are now deciding where they want to compete. They keep the markets and segments that fit their strategy and sell the rest.
For the software, this is a carve-out. The seller has to separate one part of the business from the platform it shares with everything else: its customers, contracts, charge points and the data behind them. The buyer then has to absorb that part into its own platform. Neither step works if the data can’t be cleanly split and exported.
Mer, owned by Statkraft, sold its UK public charging network to Be.EV in February 2026 to concentrate on Norway, Sweden, Germany and Austria.
Joining forces: combining for scale
Operators also combine with each other, through mergers or joint ventures, to gain density in a region, buying power with hardware vendors and partners, and a larger base to spread their costs across.
For the software, this is the most demanding of the three. Two platforms, two driver apps, two sets of contracts and often two brands have to become one network, while each legal entity keeps its own books. Until the partners settle on one platform and move onto it, the combined company runs two operations under one name.
Aneo Mobility and Elaway merged in 2026 and now trade as Joulia.
Announced in a press release, delivered in software
Whatever its kind, a deal reaches the market as a press release, a combined map of locations and sometimes a new name. Then driver apps, billing, customer contracts, roaming agreements and charge points from different manufacturers all have to come together, or come apart, before the deal does what it was meant to do.
Buyers pay for locations, grid connections, contracts and customers. A network with the best sites in a city can be a good buy whatever platform it runs on. What the platform decides is how quickly and cleanly the deal delivers what was bought, and on both sides of the table that affects how much of the deal’s value is realised. As Johan put it, “Software is no longer just a back-office question. It’s becoming a valuation question.”
AMPECO’s CEO, Orlin Radev, set out the strategic choices facing EV charging operators as the market consolidates in his ICNC26 keynote. Once a deal is in motion, the work starts on the buyer’s side.
If you’re buying: can your platform absorb the network you bought, and how fast?
The acquired charge points come from a different mix of manufacturers. Tariffs, customer accounts and contracts sit in another system. The roaming agreements that let other providers’ drivers charge on the network are signed under the seller’s operator identity, and settlement may span several legal entities. Until all of it runs on one platform, the buyer operates two businesses with two cost bases, and the savings on the deal slide stay on the slide.
Wattif, a charge point operator that has grown largely by acquiring other networks across the Nordics and Germany, shows both the problem and the way out. By the end of 2024 it had bought six portfolios, and each came with its own backend system, its own contracts and its own way of serving customers. Wattif spent 2025 bringing them onto one platform, migrating 30,000 charge points and standardising contracts along the way. Its CEO, Andreas Strand, drew the lesson on the ICNC26 Ecosystem Stage: “At some point you need to pause and consolidate into one platform.” Wattif kept buying afterwards and now runs more than 60,000 charge points across four markets.
Case study: How Wattif brought its acquired networks onto one platform and kept buying. Read how Wattif did it
Due diligence never finds everything, and the platform has to absorb the surprises as well as the plan. In Wattif’s case, one was a set of legacy charge points whose firmware could not be updated, which leaves a buyer choosing between replacing hardware it has just paid for and running it with whatever it can already do.
Time matters as much as fit. Buyers want an acquired network running on their own systems within months, and often within weeks. Stefan Ivanov, AMPECO’s CRO and co-founder, described the kind of deadline buyers bring: “A lot of our clients are acquiring other networks, and they ask us to help integrate them as soon as possible. Quite often the deadlines are tight, like migrating 3,000 charge points in two months.” More on how that work gets done is in AMPECO’s approach to migration.
Before signing, a buyer should know how long the acquired network will take to run on its own systems and what has to run in parallel until then, which of the target’s charge points, contracts and roaming agreements carry over unchanged, and who will run the migration.
If you’re selling: is your platform an asset or a liability in due diligence?
In a sale, the charge point management system (CPMS), the software that runs the network day to day, is examined like any other asset. The buyer’s team starts with the data: who owns it, and can it be exported in a usable form? Next come the vendor contracts, whether they transfer and on what terms. Then the hardware, and which of the charge points in the field the platform supports. Last comes the decision that shapes the integration plan: can the platform be handed over as it is, or does it have to be replaced on day one? Each answer either supports the price or turns into a cost the buyer deducts from it.
A platform built in-house raises its own questions in a sale: who maintains it once the team that built it stays behind, and whether the buyer can run it at all or has to plan a move from the first day.
Many sellers are growing companies. Wattif sold its UK and Ireland estate in February 2026 to focus on its four core markets, and a sale like that faces the same questions as any other.
The platform vendor is part of the picture too. A seller needs a vendor that supports the handover, confirms that support to the buyer, and lets the data leave in a usable form, whichever platform the buyer runs. A vendor that slows the process down becomes one more risk on the buyer’s list. Settle two questions well before any sale is on the agenda. Could a buyer take our data and contracts with them on short notice? And will our vendor support the handover?
What getting consolidation right looks like
Getting consolidation right shows up in one number. “Get consolidation right and the price per socket will drop,” as Johan put it on the masterclass stage. He meant what each charge point costs to run once the networks are combined: one platform, one cost base and one team spread across a bigger network.
That is when growth by acquisition starts paying for itself, on a platform that scales without the cost base growing at the same rate. The platform you run today will sit on one side of a deal one day, so the cheapest time to find out whether it’s an asset or a liability is before a deal puts it under review.
The platform consolidators run on
AMPECO sees consolidation from the inside, every week. More than 200 charging network operators in 70+ markets run on the platform, and among them are buyers bringing acquired networks onto one system and networks changing owners. AMPECO is built to be the platform for consolidators, on both sides of the deal.
For buyers, that starts with hardware. The platform supports 200+ integrated hardware vendor brands and 400+ charge point models, so many acquired estates can connect as they are, without replacing chargers. A multi-operator setup lets several legal entities and brands run as one network while each keeps its own books. And a dedicated migrations team handles the data transfer, the cutover and the reconnection of charge points and payment terminals, on the deadlines deals set. Wattif built its growth by acquisition on AMPECO, bringing every portfolio it bought onto one platform.
For sellers, AMPECO supports the handover, whichever platform the buyer runs, and the operator’s data stays the operator’s. A vendor that makes a sale easier is part of what makes a network worth buying.
Planning to grow by acquisition, or getting your network ready for a sale? See how it would run on AMPECO, and what changes from the platform you have today.
