A Scottish company building one of the UK's first all-electric intercity bus networks has raised $14m (£11m) in a Series A round as it looks to expand across the country.
Building a bus network from scratch, electric or otherwise, is not something that anyone comes up with overnight with a laptop and endless cups of coffee. A bus network requires buses, and there are plenty of them. And that's what Keith Bradbury and Pierce Glennie have been doing since founding Ember in Edinburgh in 2019, starting with a single car sourced from one of the few manufacturers willing to take it seriously. It started with the vehicle.
“In 2019, [web] Domain…We actually didn't have anything,” Bradbury said. “We approached these companies and told them we wanted to buy ‘one’ electric bus. That's because we had money. Understandably, no one takes you seriously when you say you want to buy an electric bus. Some companies laughed in our faces. ”
One company willing to do business is China's Yutong and its UK distributor Pelican, which sold the Ember as its first bus with little customization, such as seat material. In late 2020, Ember introduced the first bus route between Scotland's capital Edinburgh and the city of Dundee (the birthplace of Grand Theft Auto, reference), with connections between Glasgow, Stirling, Perth and other parts of the city in between. The route has expanded to include smaller pit stops. And even among these cities.
Currently, Ember operates 24 buses and has just received an additional 14 next-generation vehicles from Yutong City. The vehicle is equipped with a 563 kWh battery, which allows him to travel 510 km on a single charge. previous generation bus.
“Now we're at 38 years old. We have the option to actually discuss some serious numbers with Yutong and start building the vehicle to our specifications,” Bradbury said. “Our new generation vehicle didn't really exist 18 months ago. It's not just built for Ember, but we had a lot of input into product development. We are closely involved in the design, the battery layout, and the actual architecture of the vehicle. Some things cannot be changed, some things can be changed, but we are very involved in the process. I was able to input.”
The company has so far received 230 million yen in seed funding from European climate technology investors including Blue Impact, Pale Blue Dot, Contrarian Ventures, Monzo co-founder Tom Blomfield and Edinburgh-based unicorn co-founder Gareth Williams. It has raised just over $1 million. Skyscanner. And with the new injection of capital, it is preparing to expand across Scotland and the wider UK market.
Ember's Series A round was led by Inven Capital, 2150, and AENU, with participation from some of its existing backers.
The company takes a “full stack” approach to fleet development, controlling nearly every aspect of its fleet, from manufacturing and charging infrastructure to customer service and the underlying software that integrates everything.
full stack
Ember electric bus Image credit: Ember
Both the new and old versions of Ember's buses are powered by lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, which contain no cobalt and are considered more environmentally friendly. However, in addition to the increased capacity, the latest version allows faster charging at 600 kW. This 400% increase means the bus can be fully charged in less than an hour.
In addition, the bus is larger, holding 53 passengers compared to the previous vehicle's 38 passenger capacity, and more than doubling its cargo capacity.
The interior of the bus is equipped with 5G Wi-Fi and USB charging ports.
Ember internal image credit: Ember
For now, Ember counts a single main charging hub in Dundee with 1,200 kW of charging capacity, backed up by an on-site wind turbine. But with new buses continuing to arrive and plans to expand its network further afield, the company is looking to add a further four megawatts of charging capacity to additional sites in Scotland this year.
“Charging hubs will be a mix of private and public locations and will vary in size,” Bradbury said.
Ember uses a CCS (Combined Charging System) EV charging system that supports both AC and DC charging in one plug. This is a common standard in Europe and other regions, and technically means that it is not an Ember-specific charging system. In theory, Ember could help alleviate the long-standing charging infrastructure problems plaguing the UK (as well as most other countries), but Bradbury says most of it could be needed for its own operations. I think it's highly sexual.
“Our day-to-day usage is so intensive that we have limited headroom for sharing access with third parties,” he said. “However, as our network grows, we are considering enabling this in some locations, especially for commercial fleets that require more space and higher charging speeds.”
Dundee's Ember Charging Hub Image Credit: Ember
Under the hood, Ember's proprietary EmberOS software automates many of the processes involved in fleet management. For example, automatically assign drivers and vehicles to specific shifts and routes. Also, if one of his buses is scheduled for maintenance on a particular day, Ember removes it from the roster, so there are no unexpected issues with vehicle shortages.
In addition, EmberOS monitors the service for issues such as unexpected charging issues, driver no-shows, temperature control inside buses, and traffic-related delays.
“When a problem is detected, EmberOS automatically resolves the problem, for example by notifying passengers about delays or prompting drivers to turn up the heat, or by flagging a human on the operations team. erect,” Bradbury said. “Over time, we're seeing more and more problems that can be solved completely automatically, without human input.”
On the consumer side, passengers have access to real-time data about bus schedules, including which buses they are currently on and which buses they would like to board but plan to keep waiting.
Ember Passenger App Image Credit: Ember
And the secret sauce that Bradbury says will propel the company above not only traditional intercity bus companies but also other potential rivals, including established incumbents like the powerful Stagecoach, is this software. I believe that this is the underlying strength of
“We strongly believe that controlling the full stack offers fundamental efficiency benefits,” Bradbury said. “We're not trying to create incremental improvements in specific areas, but rather rebuilding the entire stack to create a model that doesn't currently exist in the market. This is only possible by linking software with hardware and operational strategy.”
The story so far
Prior to joining Ember, Bradbury and his co-founder Glennie held various roles at London-based fintech Iwoca. Going from developing credit lending software and services for small and medium-sized businesses to manufacturing electric buses may not be the most obvious career move, but it's one that Bradbury and Glennie believe will help tackle the climate crisis and the role of electrification. This decision was made after discussing our common interests. I was able to play in it.
“We're not 'bus people'; we live in London and work for a fintech company, essentially building a SaaS company,” Bradbury said. “We both decided we wanted to do something new and were very interested in how electrification could change the industry.”
Bradbury said he appreciated widespread efforts to address climate change, but wanted a solution that would reap the rewards of their efforts in the short term.
“I think there are a lot of great things, like 'green concrete' and 'nuclear fusion.' In a way, I want to work on all of those things, but the reality is they're not concrete from day one. No,” Bradbury said. . “You're doing all of this research and development, you're building towards something that's going to happen in 10 or 20 years, and it's going to have an absolutely huge impact. But we want to make an impact from the beginning. We really wanted to do something that could help, so we looked at vehicles, electrification, and all of those possibilities.”
Megabucks incumbents such as Stagecoach are also embracing electric buses, but their efforts tend to be intra-city rather than inter-city. And software plays a minimal role in these various efforts.
“When we looked at legacy industries, we didn't see innovation,” Bradbury said. “Maybe this is how people looked at fintech in the 2000s, and a lot of great companies came out of it. We've done something similar with transportation. You can look at it and come up with a whole new way of doing it.”
Why Scotland?
A quick peek into Ember's home city reveals at least one more rather novel transport initiative called CabForce, which is being touted as the UK's first public self-driving bus service. The pilot scheme, run by Stagecoach, is currently running a 20-minute park-and-ride service in west Edinburgh, with a safety driver on board just in case.
So why is Scotland attracting novel public transport services? And why is Bradbury rising from Bristol, where he lived, to launch an electric bus network north of the border? Although the Scottish Government had a somewhat more ambitious net zero plan than the Westminster Government, the size and location of Scotland played a major role in persuading Mr Bradbury to set up his business from Scotland. Ta.
“Scotland is not a unique market from a public transport perspective. There are many countries with similar road and rail networks, similar levels of car ownership, etc.,” Mr Bradbury said. “But the large size of the market makes it an interesting place to pilot services. Large enough to build a proper network, but small enough to iterate quickly. Scotland is a very good size: we can demonstrate its network at what we describe as 'mini-scale'. You can demonstrate network effects, you can demonstrate passenger demand, and you can do all of that without needing a lot of money. ”
Although Ember is currently somewhat limited in its geographical coverage, Bradbury said its plans include charging hubs in Aberdeen, Inverness, Fort William and Oban, as well as expansion deeper into Scotland. The company said it is preparing for broader expansion. Next year, he will consider working with England, but the specific route has not yet been decided.
“There are a lot of routes in the UK that could work for us, especially given the range of today's vehicles, which can cover distances of over 500 kilometers, which gives us a lot of leeway,” Bradbury said. Told. “All these hubs that are going to go live; [in Scotland] This “completes” the Scottish network in a sense and shows that what is already working for tens of thousands of passengers a week can be applied elsewhere. ”