At Zoniq, we enjoy working with companies that move fast and aren't afraid to challenge the status quo. That’s why we’re excited to officially share our work with Volta, a Prague-based team building out high-speed destination charging across Central and Eastern Europe.
Volta focuses on high-traffic retail spots, such as supermarkets and malls, throughout Czechia, Slovakia, and Poland, with new expansions into Serbia and Montenegro. Their goal is ambitious: 1,000 charging stations by 2030.
Moving Beyond the "Black Box"
Before we teamed up, Alexander Stevens, investment director at Volta, experimented with using ChatGPT to help with site due diligence and market research. While AI is useful for general inquiries, Alex found it lacked the precision needed when committing to millions of euros in infrastructure.
He noticed three main problems:
- The Consistency Gap: Running the same research multiple times often yielded different results, making it impossible to create a reliable baseline for investment.
- The "Black Box" Problem: General AI could not explain the underlying rationale or sources for its conclusions.
- Institutional Credibility: Because the logic behind the data was unverified, the results were not suitable for sharing with bankers or equity partners during financing rounds.
Volta realized that for a Charge Point Operator (CPO), having an opaque assessment process is a significant operational risk.
The Value of the Human Element
One thing Alex emphasized during our collaboration was that software alone is rarely the whole answer. He values the reactivity of the Zoniq team and the regular check-ins we’ve had over the last six months. Whether it’s taking feedback on new functionalities or providing custom deep-dive reports for specific customers, the human partnership behind the platform is what makes the data actionable.
Alex even mentioned that he stays connected to the broader market through our LinkedIn newsletter, which provides the regional trends and insights their team needs to stay competitive.
"There's no point in building it as an internal solution. So for any CPO, the added value of using Zoniq against the cost of building it from scratch yourself is much higher." — Alexander Stevens, Volta.
Turning Data into Signed Sites
By moving to a specialized, data-driven methodology, Volta has streamlined its evaluation process. What used to take days of manual research now happens in minutes, providing them with:
- Bankable Reports: Verifiable data used with bankers for debt financing and investors for equity.
- Landlord Confidence: Transparent growth projections that help retail partners understand the long-term upside of "fixed rent plus variable" lease structures.
- A Visual Pipeline: The ability to see their entire regional expansion on one map, prioritizing the sites that actually make sense based on traffic and competition.
Looking Ahead
Volta currently has a hot pipeline of about 30 locations and is in talks for over 200 more. They expect to have 40 to 50 locations signed within the next six months as they work toward their 2030 goal of 1,000 stations.
As they move into "virgin markets" like Serbia and Montenegro, we’ll be right there with them, providing the data and the human insight needed to de-risk their expansion.
