Member Article

£500,000 investment boost for local EV innovator

A local business producing a unique scheduling system has secured an investment of £500,000 from the Finance for Business North East Technology Fund towards its ambitious expansion plans.

Over the past six years, Route Monkey has developed an innovative system targeted at fleets of commercial electric vehicles. The product helps fleet managers to identify the best vehicle for delivery and collection, improving efficiency and improving returns on their investment.

They have also sealed a strategic partnership with Smith Electric Vehicles, who are one of the world’s biggest commercial electric vehicle manufacturers.

The deal will now see the Route Monkey software interfacing with Smith Electric’s telematics system Smith Link, and will work together to allow electronic vehicle fleets to make additional collections without range anxiety and interruptions affecting performance.

Despite only being up and running for two years, chief executive of Route Monkey Colin Ferguson now hopes to become the main scheduling provider for commercial electric vehicles.

He commented: “I confident that with this support from IP Group, which we are extremely grateful for, we can take Route Monkey to another level.

“We are looking to export and expand into new areas internationally, and are able to look at doing that with a much more aggressive strategy than before.”

Colin also hopes to cement the company’s roots in the region by creating new jobs in the future.

The product will reaffirm the region’s global reputation for its work in electric vehicles, which is one of the reasons Ian Wilson, investment manager at IP Group decided to invest in the business.

He added: “Route Monkey is an outstanding business, which has positioned itself well to take advantage of the many opportunities in the electric vehicles, which will undoubtedly be a real growth area in months and years to come.

“Its partnership with Smith Electric vehicles is a testament to the strength of its product.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .