The British startup Ev.energy has won the Free Electrons award, the global program that gathers the most promising companies of the energy sector with the most important public services companies in the same area of activity. The winning company was chosen by the industry giants thanks to its idea of developing a platform that aims to make electric vehicle charging a cheaper and more environmentally friendly process, accelerating the consolidation of electric mobility, a technology to which EDP and the companies forming Free Electrons have been committed for years.

The acknowledged team, who received a prize of 200,000 dollars, has developed an app for smartphones that automatically controls the vehicle’s charging and allows drivers to reduce costs and carbon emissions. The platform also handles the vehicles’ charging at home, avoiding consumption peaks, and making charging and billing more efficient. The software is already in use by one of the leading brands in the electric automobile market.

Besides from the economic support, which will help this startup in accelerating its growth, another reward that Free Electrons gives Ev.energy is the possibility to develop its projects with ten of the biggest energy companies in the world. In fact, EDP launched pilot programs with 9 of the 15 finalist companies, thus making its business units available to them, to which they were able to showcase their innovative solutions.

The applicants for this award presented a total of 58 projects, which will not be forgotten, as many of them are pending to close deals and investments with the sponsor companies. This way of promoting the development of innovation is one of EDP’s priorities, which already understood more than a decade ago the transformation that the energy sector would undertake and the necessity to focus on the search of the best new companies all over the world.

In this third edition, which has passed through various geographies – such as Dublin, Ohio, Hong Kong and Lisbon – counted with the inscription of 500 startups coming from 60 countries, of which only 15 became finalists. Applications for the fourth edition will be open in November.