Emobi and ElectricFish join forces to accelerate grid-independent EV charging depot expansion across North America

Emobi, North America’s largest EV charging roaming network and developer of the JustPlug digital infrastructure platform, has announced a strategic partnership with ElectricFish to scale ultra-fast, grid-independent public and fleet charging depots. The move combines Emobi’s patented interoperability technology with ElectricFish’s microgrid-scale battery-integrated systems to enable rapid EV infrastructure deployment without relying on costly or delayed grid upgrades.

This collaboration positions Emobi at the center of a growing EV charging ecosystem, as the U.S. accelerates clean mobility infrastructure development in line with federal electrification goals. By enabling faster, interoperable deployment and supporting Plug & Charge across both public and fleet sectors, the partnership aims to remove two persistent barriers to mass EV adoption: compatibility fragmentation and electrical grid constraints.

Why is Emobi teaming up with ElectricFish?

The strategic alliance between Emobi and ElectricFish addresses a fundamental bottleneck in the EV transition—charging infrastructure that is both fast and grid-resilient. While public and private stakeholders are racing to deploy charging stations, many installations remain stalled due to the high cost and long lead times of necessary grid upgrades. In many U.S. cities, utility interconnections for high-powered charging units can take up to 24 months and exceed $100,000 in infrastructure-related costs.

ElectricFish has built its value proposition around overcoming these barriers. Its 350Squared platform combines proprietary power electronics and high-capacity energy storage to deliver 133% faster charging than traditional Level 3 systems. More critically, the solution operates independent of expensive grid upgrades and can be deployed flexibly, even in constrained or underserved areas.

Emobi’s JustPlug platform complements this by solving another critical challenge—interoperability. While most current EVs and chargers lack native Plug & Charge capabilities, Emobi’s software-only solution enables secure, automated charging for 80% of legacy systems. The encrypted architecture ensures centralized certificate-based authentication and seamless roaming, thereby reducing driver friction and increasing operator revenue through higher charger utilization.

The companies’ partnership effectively brings together a grid-independent hardware platform with a software layer that eliminates protocol fragmentation—providing a turnkey solution for municipalities, fleets, and commercial real estate owners who want to scale EV charging quickly.

Where will JustPlug-enabled charging stations launch first?

The initial rollout of the integrated Emobi–ElectricFish system will take place in Detroit in Michigan and Redwood City and Oakland in California. These locations have been chosen for their strategic alignment with regional fleet electrification and smart city initiatives. In these pilots, drivers will be able to access ultra-fast charging that feels like fueling a gas-powered car—while enjoying the added benefits of EV infrastructure, such as real-time power monitoring, V2G readiness, and predictive energy dispatch from the battery systems.

The pilot installations will also serve as live demonstrations of ElectricFish’s on-site energy storage capabilities. The company’s technology is designed to deliver power during grid outages and peak demand hours, ensuring high availability and reducing demand charges for commercial operators. For Emobi, the pilots are a way to showcase JustPlug’s network-effect potential: each additional JustPlug-enabled station expands a seamless cross-operator ecosystem with centralized data management, authentication, and billing.

How the Emobi–ElectricFish model disrupts traditional charging infrastructure

The combined offering is a sharp contrast to the prevailing utility-first model of EV charging infrastructure, which is hampered by permitting delays, transformer limitations, and interconnection queue backlogs. Instead of waiting for the grid to catch up, ElectricFish’s solution integrates 350 kW+ output charging directly with battery storage, allowing systems to be deployed quickly and operate reliably regardless of site limitations.

This speed advantage is critical in the fleet sector, where time is revenue. Delivery, logistics, and rideshare operators require high uptime and predictable performance. ElectricFish enables depot charging without complex substation coordination, while Emobi ensures that authentication, telemetry, and driver interaction are seamless across different fleets and networks.

For public charging operators, the interoperability delivered by JustPlug provides immediate ROI. According to Emobi, Plug & Charge sessions result in 27% longer dwell times and up to 40% higher charger utilization. With Emobi’s certificate-based authentication and direct API integrations, operators can reduce maintenance costs, avoid app-based fragmentation, and meet both NEVI compliance and ISO 15118 standards—all through software.

EV infrastructure growth driven by policy and investor tailwinds

This announcement arrives amid a wave of federal, state, and private funding aimed at scaling EV charging. The Biden administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law allocated $7.5 billion for charging infrastructure, while the Inflation Reduction Act has expanded tax credits for clean transportation and fleet electrification. Against this backdrop, venture funding in the EV charging space reached $4.1 billion globally in 2024, according to BloombergNEF.

The market is also responding. With over 1.2 million EVs sold in the U.S. in 2024—a 47% year-over-year increase—charging demand is surging faster than physical infrastructure can keep up. The Emobi–ElectricFish model presents a compelling way to close this gap without waiting for grid expansion.

From a venture perspective, the partnership signals a convergence of capital-efficient, software-defined platforms (Emobi) and resilient, modular hardware systems (ElectricFish), both of which are seen as investable themes in the next decade of energy transition. Investors are increasingly focused on solution stacks that can scale in diverse real estate and regulatory environments—attributes this partnership squarely delivers.

Early sentiment from the EV ecosystem

Though neither company is publicly traded, early signals from the EV ecosystem suggest positive sentiment. Several municipal procurement officers, according to LinkedIn job postings and project RFIs, have included grid-independent fast charging as a requirement for upcoming tenders. Industry analysts have noted that “plug-and-play” fleet depot models are attracting new capital, especially where vehicle-to-grid (V2G) capabilities are layered in.

Charging infrastructure aggregators and integrators—such as Volta, EVgo (NASDAQ: EVGO), and ChargePoint (NYSE: CHPT)—are likely to monitor the Emobi–ElectricFish model closely, as it introduces a software-first pathway to scaling both hardware utilization and protocol compliance without extensive retrofitting.

Additionally, Emobi’s ability to support 80% of legacy vehicles and chargers without hardware upgrades may prove especially disruptive. This addresses one of the sector’s costliest pain points: upgrading outdated chargers to meet ISO 15118 and Plug & Charge standards. If widely adopted, the model could reduce millions in retrofit costs and speed up time-to-market for operators.

What’s next for Emobi and ElectricFish?

Looking ahead, both companies are positioning the partnership as a blueprint for nationwide deployment. Emobi has previously signaled its intent to serve as the digital backbone of the North American EV charging ecosystem, and this partnership allows it to extend that vision beyond roaming and public charging into private fleets, corporate campuses, and commercial depots.

ElectricFish, meanwhile, is expected to expand manufacturing and logistics capacity in order to meet deployment demand. According to internal filings reviewed by industry watchers, the company is also in discussions with fleet operators, including last-mile logistics providers and municipal transportation authorities, to pilot larger depot-scale installations with JustPlug compatibility.

The companies have indicated that future developments may include bidirectional charging, onsite renewables integration, and AI-driven power dispatch optimization. These features will make the offering even more attractive for enterprise fleets looking to turn depots into profit centers through energy arbitrage, grid services participation, and vehicle-to-building interactions.

As U.S. states begin enforcing EV mandates and cities push zero-emission fleet goals, integrated, scalable, and standards-compliant charging platforms like this one could be decisive in achieving the necessary infrastructure coverage.