MKB Brandstof accelerates EV growth with Road

Meet MKB Brandstof: powering Dutch mobility

MKB Brandstof, a prominent player in the Dutch mobility market, has a rich history of serving the small business sector (freelancers, SMEs) and larger organisations. Having initially achieved significant growth with fuel cards for small entrepreneurs, MKB Brandstof proactively expanded its portfolio over the years to include a comprehensive suite of mobility services such as parking, car wash, and integrated mobile apps.

Recognising the accelerating transition to electric mobility, a key trend for Dutch businesses aiming for sustainability, they expanded into the EV market in 2020 by launching their own charging station offering. However, their initial white-label solution for charging stations presented significant scalability and control challenges, hindering their ambitions in the rapidly evolving EV market.

At a glance : MKB Brandstof's EV success with Road

Facing challenges in scalability, operational control, and customer experience, MKB Brandstof turned to Road. Road’s CPO and MSP platform delivered direct operational management, enhanced branding, improved efficiency, and fuelled substantial growth in MKB Brandstof’s EV station network.

Navigating the bumps: the hurdles before Road

To enter the market quickly, MKB Brandstof initially partnered with a white-label provider for their charging operations. While effective at first, this setup became a “black box” that limited their control and visibility. The complexity of the multi-layered system, where their partner also used another third-party platform, created what MKB Brandstof termed an “extra link in the chain,” leading to operational friction and higher overhead. As their network expanded, it became clear they had outgrown this model and needed a more direct and scalable solution.

To support their growth and improve service quality, MKB Brandstof identified several critical requirements. They needed a platform that would give them the direct control to:

• Remotely monitor station status, perform resets, and access diagnostics to improve service speed.

• Streamline crucial financial processes like credit reimbursements to ensure accuracy and timeliness.

• Take full ownership of the customer experience, including custom branding on charging station displays.

Charting the course: why MKB Brandstof chose Road & the path to success

Needing a more robust, controllable solution, MKB Brandstof researched extensively (three to four years ago) before choosing Road. Key factors included Road's technically flexible, API-driven platform. MKB Brandstof states, "We are quite a technical IT organisation ourselves, so we had specific requirements. Road was able to accommodate these well with their white-label solution."

Effective branding integration and strong value for money were also decisive. Additionally, Road's modularity was crucial, allowing MKB Brandstof to use their own customer service and select specific support. "It was also good that we could choose what we needed and what we didn't," MKB Brandstof noted, adding, "It’s very pleasant for us that if we run into issues, MKB can turn to Road's support for more complex cases – technically with developers, on a higher level with the customer success manager, or for practical cases via the support team. Those direct lines are very helpful."

Road's platform and MKB Brandstof's breakthrough

In close collaboration, Road and MKB Brandstof defined clear roles to create a tailored solution. Road stepped in to manage reimbursement payments to private individuals, an area that had previously been complex and resource-intensive for MKB Brandstof.

“As you were able to take over the reimbursement invoices and handle payments to private individuals, it really helped us… bringing that process in-house would have required significant work and investment,” they noted.

The transition involved a major migration effort, referred to as the “CPO wissel" (CPO switch), to move existing charging stations onto Road’s platform: “The migration itself went smoothly. We had a lot of contact with your technical teams to prepare the connections.”

They transferred customer accounts, user addresses, and other essential data in a single large API-driven batch. Between May and August 2023, roughly 500 stations were included in the migration. About two-thirds were switched remotely, while the remaining one-third, around 160 older stations, required physical SIM card replacements, a task handled by the previous partner as part of the offboarding process.

Overall, the core migration was completed in approximately four months.

Road’s API first approach, combined with MKB Brandstof’s strong technical capabilities, formed the foundation of this successful implementation. Road’s hardware-agnostic platform added further agility, ensuring the solution could adapt seamlessly to a wide range of charging infrastructure.

The impact: measurable growth and enhanced EV operations

• Over 800 charging stations are now live and centrally managed via the Road platform.

• More than 210,000 transactions are processed in the Road platform.

• Over 20,000 invoices have been processed automatically through the platform, ensuring timely and accurate billing at scale.

Beyond this quantitative growth, MKB Brandstof has experienced notable improvements in technical capabilities and service quality, including:

• A technically advanced platform with enhanced control: MKB Brandstof observed that Road is "technically more advanced," crucially providing them with direct insight into station statuses, remote reset capabilities, and access to diagnostic error codes, features that were lacking with their previous "black box" partner and are vital for proactive management.

• Real-time transaction processing: they particularly value that Road "forward[s] transactions in real-time, while elsewhere in the market it can still be standard for this to take a while," ensuring MKB Brandstof has immediate and accurate data for their operations and customer information.

• Consistently high station uptime: this critical metric is achieved and maintained through Road’s robust platform monitoring, which includes proactive notifications and alerts if a station goes offline or experiences specific faults, thereby enabling a rapid and targeted response to minimise downtime.

• Reliable and consistent financial processes: both credit reimbursements to private individuals and general invoicing have seen marked improvement in reliability and consistency, now happening smoothly and "like clockwork every month," often processed at the same time each cycle for better predictability.

• Highly automated station configuration: the process to onboard and configure new charging stations is now so automated and straightforward that it significantly reduces the manual effort and time previously required, "running so smoothly, we almost forget about it."

These enhancements have directly translated into improved operational efficiency and greater control. MKB Brandstof can now pursue faster growth due to easier deployment and maintenance of their station fleet, coupled with reduced turnaround times for customer support issues and lower overhead costs. Cost reductions achieved through automation and seamless system integration via APIs, has significantly improved their overall business performance.

Key metrics underpinning this success include the impressive growth in stations and passes, sustained station uptime, enhanced reliability of financial processes, ease of new station onboarding, reduced overhead, and faster issue resolution.

Driving forward: the evolving partnership

MKB Brandstof expects its partnership with Road to keep expanding. They plan to experiment with advanced, dynamic tariffs for drivers with variable energy contracts, noting: “We’re looking to test that soon.” Road’s hardware-agnostic platform will support future flexibility: “It will be very useful if we seriously consider other brands.”

They also see potential in deeper app integrations: “Innovation might lie there, unlocking features from the Road platform in our app via API connections.”

The collaboration is viewed as a strategic combination of strengths: “We don’t have to take everything as a standard package, Road adapts, and we can merge specific components into the best solution for us.”

On long-term strategy, MKB Brandstof highlights the need for scale in EV: “To stay viable, you need growth. It creates economies of scale and ensures we can always offer reliable, consistent solutions and pricing to our customers.”

Road's Perspective: this commitment to adaptive technology and supporting market leadership reflects Road's core philosophy: empowering our partners to not only navigate the complexities of the e-mobility landscape but to thrive and innovate within it.

As MKB Brandstof continues to innovate with dynamic tariffs and new hardware, they are well-positioned to further support the Dutch SME sector's drive towards comprehensive fleet electrification and ambitious sustainability targets.

Power your EV ambitions: let's connect

Ready to gain control, scale your EV charging operations, and enhance your customer experience? Contact Road today for a demo and discover how our flexible platform can power your e-mobility success.