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Europe's biggest carmakers are drawing on the full force of the continent's industrial prowess to build a network of ultra-fast charging stations as they look to stoke demand for electric cars and break Tesla's stranglehold on the market.

BMW, Volkswagen (VOWG_p.DE), Ford and Daimler plan to build about 400 next-generation charging stations in Europe that can reload an electric car in minutes instead of hours.

The long time it takes to charge batteries is one of the main disadvantages of electric cars compared to conventional cars with gasoline tanks that can be filled up in seconds.

Until now, drivers of electric cars have had to leave their vehicles plugged in for hours at a charging station for a journey between cities, making many long range journeys impractical.

Installing new, faster chargers would spur the overall market, and also help the traditional car manufacturers close the gap with Tesla, the Silicon Valley-based e-car leader, which maintains its own network of charging stations. Tesla's chargers are the fastest in the industry, and are incompatible with existing electric cars made by rivals.

The carmakers are roping in experts from the European power and engineering industry, including Germany's Innogy, E.ON and Siemens and Portugal's Efacec, which are all working on the technology, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The new 350 kilowatt (kW) chargers would be nearly three times as powerful as Tesla's.

"This is a structured and concerted effort across sectors to tackle the infrastructure issue in a real way," one of the sources said.

A spokesman for Ford, speaking on behalf of the consortium, said talks with possible partners had started, adding he expected several energy providers to be part of the planned network, without elaborating further.

Tesla's tech billionaire CEO Elon Musk has hinted that the company will not be outdone, tweeting that 350 kW chargers are a "children's toy". A Germany-based spokeswoman for the company declined to comment beyond Musk's remarks.

* (Tesla Supercharger, West Lebanon, NH. Credit: AdamChandler86/ flickr)