- Enel X Way North America, maker of the JuiceBox connected charger, is shutting down.
- Owners of the charger got an abrupt notice when they found they could not connect to their chargers.
- It is unclear what long-term support, if any, that owners will get.
With the bankruptcy of Fisker and a prominent Chinese automaker, we've gotten a hint of what happens to an electric vehicle when a company folds and potentially cuts off service to its software-connected features. But now, EV owners in North America are getting an unfortunate taste of what happens when their home charging provider calls it quits as well.
Enel X Way North America, the local subsidiary of the European energy giant, abruptly announced it is shutting down operations on this continent, citing a difficult financial environment. That's bad news for customers of its JuiceBox home EV charger. While the chargers will still charge owners' cars, all software and connected services were turned off Wednesday, according to the company and multiple customer accounts.
"All Enel X Way software will be discontinued," the company said in a statement. Commercial charging stations will lose functionality in the absence of software continuity. The Enel X Way App and all other Enel e-mobility apps in North America will be discontinued and removed from the App Store."
Losing app access means owners give up the ability to schedule, set and monitor home charging, see energy use and other remote features. These were major selling points for the JuiceBox charger—and indeed, any decent home EV charger—and they're now completely gone. As the company's statement noted, commercial charging stations will be entirely offline as well.
Enel X Way indicated that an unnamed "experienced third-party firm will be appointed to manage the company’s affairs and ensure that the closure is handled with the utmost care and professionalism." However, owners say that's the opposite of what they've gotten this week.
One entity, operating system developer ChargeLab, said that it is offering to take over the JuiceBox commercial network. "Commercial site hosts impacted by the discontinuation of Enel X Way software should contact ChargeLab today to discuss migration options before Enel X Way servers are permanently disabled," the company said in a statement.
The JuiceBox charger was acquired by Enel X Energy in 2017. The company said it will instead focus on markets where it is an electricity retailer, which it is not in North America. It also blamed challenging business conditions in the U.S. market for the decision. "Additionally, the dynamics of the EV market in the U.S. have changed quite a lot in the last year and, like many other companies, Enel X Way North America has been impacted by high interest rates which have increased the cost of scaling the charging infrastructure business in a framework of sustained uncertainty where EV sales growth expectations have not been met," company officials said.
Unfortunate as it is, some contraction of the charging sector is largely believed to be inevitable. A number of players got into the space early, but will be consolidated or edged out over time by the bigger and more successful ones.
But that's only one part of the equation. The other is taking care of the customers who bought into its charging ecosystem, especially those who were working with local energy retailers. With any luck, Enel X Energy will find some way to restore their service or find some kind of path for long-term support; certainly, social media pressure on the company does not seem to be letting up.
Moreover, it reveals the perils of what can happen with connected hardware over time when the entity backing that hardware goes offline. It's why at least one open-source EV charging company, Electric Avenue, said that the entire industry needs to embrace that approach.
“The news of Enel X’s departure from North America is deeply concerning for the EV charging industry, but it’s not entirely unexpected. The closure highlights a fundamental flaw in how many EV charging systems are built—with hardware tied exclusively to proprietary software," said Electric Avenue President Mark MacDonald in an email. "When companies leave the market or change direction, customers are left in an impossible situation, facing costly hardware replacements and limited options for their charging networks."
Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com
