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Electrify America Gets a New CEO Following Recent Mishaps and Incoming Price Hikes

Electrify America’s (and Electrify Canada’s) CEO Giovanni Palazzo is leaving the top management role. The man is taking a step back but will remain on the company’s decision-making team. Here’s what’s going on and who is replacing him.
Electrify America Gets a New CEO 10 photos
Photo: Electrify America / autoevolution edit
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Born from the ashes of Dieselgate, Electrify America did not have a great time in the last couple of months customer experience-wise. Many have complained online about the reliability of the company’s chargers. A couple of stalls appeared on the virtual map as working while they were offline. Some EV drivers almost lost their vehicles because of charging issues, while other technologically-inclined people figured out how to bypass the charger’s default app and went online to put the competitor’s charging map on the Electrify America charger.

So, from a customer perspective, things are not going that great. However, when expanding a network of over 3,500 chargers that covers almost the entire country and parts of its northern neighbor, errors can happen, especially as technology continues to improve. Nobody is perfect. Deploying such a vast number of stalls and making sure everything works fine at more than 800 locations is a challenge.

However, Electrify America has impressive backers and proper financing. It should be able to fix everything in a timely manner and verify that its charging stations work just fine. Let’s hope they will learn from what happened recently.

The management change comes right before the VW-owned and Siemens-backed charging network is getting ready to apply new price hikes across the U.S. Still, the outgoing CEO pointed out a couple of milestones achieved under his tenure. Palazzo underlined the 17 partnerships with EV manufacturers (which include those “complimentary miles” or “passes” you might have heard about), the launch of Electrify Home charging solutions for individuals who want a superior charger at their house, and the delivery of six million charging sessions in 2022.

“Over the next few months, I will be transitioning from my current role as President & CEO of Electrify America to my next chapter with the company as Chairman of the Board of Electrify America and Senior Vice President of Global Charging and Energy at Volkswagen AG,” said Palazzo as he backs away from an active role to a more administrative one.

Usually, the Chairman of the Board sits higher than the CEO in a company’s management structure. However, the Chairman and the CEO are often known to effectively co-lead a company by working together. This is what might happen at Electrify America as well since the current CEO is planning on serving as senior VP at VW after he leaves the current role. So, things can go even smoother!

The transition began already, but it will be a couple of months before the new CEO can fully take the reins. Electrify America’s current VP of Technology, Robert Barrosa, will replace Giovanni Pallazo. He said the company achieved “so much in so little time,” but from now on, everyone will have “much more to do.”

It’s a new day for Electrify America, but it does not represent the start of a dramatic change. We’ll what the new CEO will do considering all the challenges he’ll have to face regarding the increasing costs of doing business, the NEVI funding, and the intense competition coming from Tesla’s Supercharging network, EVGO, Chargepoint, and even the likes of Rivian with its Waypoints and Adventure Network.

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About the author: Florin Amariei
Florin Amariei profile photo

Car shows on TV and his father's Fiat Tempra may have been Florin's early influences, but nowadays he favors different things, like the power of an F-150 Raptor. He'll never be able to ignore the shape of a Ferrari though, especially a yellow one.
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