Automakers Rush to Produce Connectors for Tesla’s Supercharger Network as NACS Adoption Expands. Following several major automakers’ announcements to adopt Tesla’s North American Charging Standard (NACS) earlier this year, the race has begun to produce the necessary connectors for the growing number of electric vehicles (EVs) that will soon be able to utilize Tesla’s Supercharger network.
The recent addition of BMW, planning to adopt NACS in 2025, further expanded the list of EVs that will be compatible with the Supercharger network. Elon Musk’s promise to open up the network to other automakers is finally being fulfilled as more companies embrace NACS.
However, this sudden migration to NACS has created a manufacturing crunch, as numerous new and existing EV models require NACS adapters, as do third-party charging stations.
ChargePoint, a major charging station operator with over 243,000 chargers in North America and Europe, is now introducing NACS connector support and expects most of its stations to be converted by November. This quick timeline means that cable conversion kits will be distributed to ChargePoint stations in the coming weeks, providing Tesla owners access to a third-party charging network without the need for adapters.
Pasquale Romano, CEO of ChargePoint, expressed the need for native connector solutions, citing over 35 million historical ChargePoint sessions initiated by Tesla vehicles.
To prepare for this transition, ChargePoint began producing stations with NACS ports earlier this year and has been preparing a significant number of NACS cables and connectors for the upcoming retrofit in November.
While NACS adoption expands, CCS connectors will still remain in use for some time, as not all EV users may be able to switch easily. ChargePoint will continue to feature CCS connectors alongside NACS connectors for the foreseeable future. However, in the long term, the CCS standard will likely face a similar fate to CHAdeMO, as NACS becomes more widely accepted.
Get Cars Value provides updated news & trends regularly. Article sourced from autoweek
