Those keeping an eye on China may have noted that, at the recent 2019 annual plenary sessions of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), Chen Hong, deputy to the National People’s Congress and Chairman of the SAIC, highlighted the pressing need for systematic support and policy to promote the adoption of clean energy vehicles. He pressed that relevant departments need to increase the construction of infrastructure such as charging piles to ensure easy access to the people. Specifically, he suggested that:

the power sector must develop an actionable plan to gradually update and transform existing power grids to meet the needs of charging pile enterprise operations; relevant managerial departments must implement preferential policies to reduce the cost of charging pile enterprise operations while simultaneously reducing the costs incurred by the end-users.

According to the statistics of the National Energy Administration of China, there were 728,000 electric vehicle charging piles in China in November 2018. Currently, the vehicle to charging pile ratio is 6.8 to 1; well below the target 1 to 1 ratio. This lag in the construction of charging piles has affected the development and adoption of clean energy vehicles.

With this backdrop in mind, the Matrix AI Network and the Intelligent Electrical Charging Chain (IECC) are pleased to announce that they have signed a strategy cooperation agreement.

The IECC is a new company committed to developing the shared charging pile industry by mobilizing idle personal charging piles to maximize utilization. It was founded by core members of EVAIO. The IECC will use blockchain technology to incentivize users while ensuring data security and user privacy. Car owners can upload their vehicle data to the chain and use tokens to pay for the use of idle charging piles. Meanwhile, charging pile owners will be able to convert tokens into fiat currency on the secondary market.

The IECC plans to rapidly expand the availability of charging piles by deploying and installing their own proprietary charging piles. These will have in-built Matrix AI Network FPGA mining machines and AI accelerators. This means that, when not charging vehicles, the IECC’s idle charging piles will conduct Matrix AI Network mining and deep-learning tasks. In essence, each IECC charging pile will serve as a node in the Matrix AI Network and help ensure the network’s normal operations.

Despite this project being in its infancy, it has to potential to prove fruitful due to the presence of favorable policy and a swelling in market demand for clean energy vehicles. More details and progress updates will be shared in the coming months.