Volta Industries Inc., which entered into a business combination with Tortoise Acquisition Corp. II, has launched its PredictEV product with a multi-year commitment from Southern Company. PredictEV, a machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) solution for infrastructure planning, was created to support Volta Charging’s commerce-centric, electric vehicle charging network. It is now available to corporate, public agency, government, consulting and utility organizations.
Southern Company, which serves more than 4.3 million electric power customers in Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, expects to use the product to guide its plans to meet rising EV demand and to create new EV product offerings for its customers. This commitment expands upon Volta’s existing collaboration with Southern Company’s subsidiary, Alabama Power, to support data-driven EV infrastructure planning in its service territory.
Using advanced AI and analytics, the PredictEV product aggregates disparate data sets to turn them into actionable insights for EV stakeholders. The proprietary, patented-pending product analyzes local mobility, demographic, corporate and site-specific data at scale to identify key planning drivers such as suitable vehicle charging locations, the right mix of charging infrastructure and expected EV adoption in a particular geography.
“Data and AI influence every aspect of Volta’s business – from driver experience, to media strategy, to network development,” says Praveen Mandal, chief technology officer at Volta Charging. “We are excited to share our data-driven insights and foresights with partners like Southern Company that are as passionate about driving the EV market forward as we are. These partnerships have the capacity to transform the decision making that underpins our joint mission of creating a carbon-free transportation future.”
