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British electric charger companies are asking rivals to buy them as they run out of cash amid rising costs and intense competition, according to industry bosses.

A wave of mergers and acquisitions is likely to shrink the number of charge point operators from as many as 150 to a market dominated by five or six players, said Asif Ghafoor, a co-founder of Be.EV, a charging company backed by Octopus Energy.

Investors rushed to pour money into green technologies and the electric car industry during the pandemic, fuelled by cheap borrowing. Yet now with intense competition, rising costs, and delays to government funding, some charger companies are running short of cash and investors are looking for a return on their investments, according to several people in the industry.

Simon Smith, the chief executive of Voltempo, which focuses on charge points for lorries, said: “Charging is getting more capital intensive and more competitive at the same time. That means two things decide who survives: the right sites and fast utilisation. If volumes do not ramp [up], payback stretches, assets get stranded and consolidation follows. That is just infrastructure market logic.”

The number of chargers installed in the UK has soared in recent years as companies raced to win market share. There were nearly 88,000 charge points across 45,000 UK locations at the end of 2025, according to the data company Zapmap.

Many charge point operators are making money, but others have installed points in anticipation of future demand, meaning they do not yet earn enough to cover costs, even if they are likely to as the number of electric cars on British roads rises rapidly.

Ghafoor said “numerous” unnamed businesses have approached Be.EV looking for a buyer. “Companies are running out of money,” he said. “This is a very crowded space. We’ve got too many operators. All of these businesses are going to come together … That consolidation will allow investment and that scale.”

Businesses could be keen to complete takeovers in an attempt to gain economies of scale including the same number of back office staff overseeing more charge points, the ability to negotiate bigger, cheaper nationwide contracts, and buying power in bulk.

The oil company Shell owns the biggest UK network, followed by the government-backed Connected Kerb and the EDF-owned Pod Point. However, there are a host of other competitors, ranging from Sainsbury’s supermarkets, fossil fuel companies such as BP and Total, the Scottish car retailer Arnold Clark, and the carmakers BMW, Ford, Hyundai, Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen, which back the Ionity network.

“If you look at any of these markets, typically what you see is everyone wakes up and says, ‘I’ll have a go’,” said Ghafoor. “EV charging has been the widest ‘I’ll have a go’ sector I’ve been involved in.”

The competition has forced smaller players to look for niches where they can find profits. Be.EV, with 2,500 chargers, is focusing on ultra-rapid charging at busy destinations such as retail parks and coffee shops. The company, which is backed with £110m from Octopus Energy, is also pursuing its own acquisitions of smaller players. Voltempo installs charge points at lorry depots, whose owners have a predictable source of demand and the ability to hire out their chargers to other users such as van fleets.

The timing of the pandemic-era investment surge may also be adding to pressure on charge point operators. Some private equity (PE) and venture capital investors aim to make investments over five-year periods before they need to show their own backers a financial return. Ghafoor said “the PE cycle – flip within five years – that probably creates more pressure” on charging companies if they are struggling to make the business profitable.