Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Blink Charging fourth quarter 2021 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants have been placed on a listen- only mode, and we will open the floor for your questions and comments after the presentation. It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to your host, John Nesbett, Investor Relations for Blink Charging. Sir, the floor is yours.
Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Blink Charging's fourth quarter and year-end 2021 Investor Call. On the call today we have Michael Farkas, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Brendan Jones, President, and Michael Rama, Chief Financial Officer. Please note that there is a slide presentation accompanying today's earnings call whereby viewers can follow along. The slides can be accessed on the investor relations section of the Blink Charging website. I'd like to take a moment to read the safe harbor statement. This conference call contains forward-looking statements as defined within Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 as amended and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 as amended.
These forward-looking statements in terms such as anticipate, expect, intend, may, will, should, or other comparable terms involve risks and uncertainties because they relate to events and depend on circumstances that will occur in the future. These statements include statements regarding intent, belief or current expectations of Blink and members of its management, as well as the assumptions on which such statements are based. Prospective investors are cautioned that any such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties, including those described in Blink's periodic reports filed with the SEC, and that actual results may differ materially from those contemplated by such forward-looking statements. Except as required by federal securities law, Blink undertakes no obligation to update or revise forward-looking statements to reflect changed conditions. I will now turn the call over to Michael Farkas, CEO of Blink Charging. Go ahead, Mike.
Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us. We delivered a strong close to 2021 with record fourth quarter revenue of $7.9 million, driven by exceptionally strong product sales and service revenue. This growth represented a 224% increase versus fourth quarter 2020 and a 24% increase compared to the third quarter of 2021. Our fourth quarter was reflective of the momentum we've seen throughout 2021, where we continued to win exclusive multi-year contracts with property owner partners in high density areas. In the quarter, we contracted, sold, and deployed over 3,733 commercial and residential chargers and have grown the number of commercial Blink-only charging stations by more than 253% compared to the same quarter last year.
While EVs currently represent a small percentage of new car sales in the U.S., that percentage is growing every year, and the appetite to accelerate EV use is high, as evidenced by the state and federal legislation being implemented to incentivize fleet operators and individual drivers to make the switch to EVs. With this transition in mind, we continue to target high volume venues in the deployment of our chargers so that we'll be in the best position to capitalize on high utilization rates as more EVs hit the road for personal and industrial use. In addition to municipal locations, multifamily residential and healthcare facilities, we're seeing more opportunities to collaborate with commercial partners and mainstream consumer brands, as demonstrated by our recent agreements with General Motors and Bridgestone, which Brendan will discuss in more detail later in the call.
Throughout 2021, the company had success winning new grant and rebate awards from various government programs, receiving $26 .5 in awards for this year. We also continued to add the most talented people in the industry to support our expected growth with over 43 new employees added in the quarter. Internationally, we continue to leverage Blue Corner to drive our growth in Europe. During the quarter we announced the opening of a new office in Noida, India, to enhance our ability to develop and innovate new technology and to serve as a key hub for operations serving the Asia-Pacific and Middle Eastern regions. As you can see on slide five, the EV industry is in the early stages of massive growth and will continue for the foreseeable future. As a 12-year veteran, Blink is well positioned at the forefront of this expansion.
We have provided this graphic before and again here because, to properly understand Blink's opportunity, we think it's important to illustrate the anticipated potential trends for the worldwide growth of EVs and EV infrastructure. The International Energy Agency projects global EV sales to go from three million vehicles in 2020 to about 25 million vehicles in 2030, a 24% CAGR growth over that period of time. With sales of EV transportation segments expected to grow exponentially, there will be an ever-increasing need for additional charging infrastructure. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, the country reached a milestone this past year with its 100,000th EV charger installed in 2021. Industry analysts at Guidehouse Insights forecast that we'll need a total of 120 million chargers globally by 2030, providing a tremendous opportunity for us to greatly expand our charging footprint.
As you know, the legislative environment around EV adoption is extremely favorable and represents a strong catalyst for this transition to EV use. The recently passed $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill includes $7.5 billion for the buildup of our nation's EV charging network. Which makes sense in the context of the administration's stated goal to have half of the vehicles sold in the U.S. in 2030 be zero-emission vehicles and also to have 500,000 EV charging stations in place by that same year. The establishment of convenient and reliable charging is a necessity for the successful transition to EV use, and we believe this legislation will provide opportunities to significantly accelerate the development and deployment of an expansive EV charging network in the United States. Looking at slide six, we outline Blink's unique value proposition.
First, our products are designed and built with the most advanced technology and with future innovation in mind. In fact, at the Consumer Electronics Show, CES, in January, we unveiled seven next-generation EV charging products, which I'll describe in more detail a bit later. Of note, we are rolling out a portfolio of industry-leading products, including both hardware and software, to address the quickly growing EV fleet market. This market represents a significant and growing opportunity for us as commercial fleets are being offered attractive incentives to make the EV transition, and the federal government is aggressively making the change to greener fleet vehicles. Not only are our technology solutions representative of our leadership position at the forefront of the EV charging industry, they further enhance our vertical integration capabilities.
A competitive advantage of our product is that unlike many of the competing chargers on the market, our chargers are built to avoid obsolescence. We believe these new products will serve as a variety of industries, will drive significant sales, and will drive new opportunities moving forward. In addition to our commitment to delivering the best technology, the longevity of our chargers is a critical factor contributing to the value of our owner operator model. While we offer our customers several deployment options with the goal of meeting their specific needs, we largely focus on the Blink-owned model, where we identify the best technology solution for each location, then install and maintain the charger while receiving recurring revenue from its utilization. It is in our interest to ensure that our chargers work effectively and efficiently for many years to come.
I'd also like to point out through our various business models, we provide best-in-class products with long-term exclusive contracts with automatic extensions. These agreements allow Blink to establish a long-term market presence at our customers' locations and add chargers at our discretion as demand increases. Our contracts are not about a parking space. Our contracts are about an entire address, and every parking space in that location is ours to serve exclusively. Due to the breadth and depth of our offerings, Blink is the only fully vertically integrated EV infrastructure charging company in the U.S. today. Significant and strategic expansion of our domestic and international charging footprint continues to be a key focus.
We are intent on establishing a foothold in locations that will not only meet the needs of current EV drivers, but also in areas that will enable us to capitalize on opportunities as the world continues its transition to EVs. We're very optimistic about our growth in the U.S. and believe Europe, which has more quickly adopted the shift to EVs, will serve as a replicable framework for the rollout of infrastructure in the U.S. We are continuously growing Blink's leadership position in the U.S., and our acquisition of Blue Corner is accelerating our presence in Europe. Additionally, we are seeing tremendous opportunities to continue expanding our brand and network in Latin America, South America, and the Caribbean as these regions begin to design their EV infrastructure plans.
We are positioned for the continued expansion of Blink's footprint through organic growth, strategic partnerships, and extremely strong focus on M&A opportunities, particularly through the anticipated consolidation of the industry. Furthermore, as EV adoption accelerates and we continue to expand our global footprint of strategically placed charging stations, we believe we will generate increasing recurring service revenues moving forward. This is an exciting and transformational time for our company, and we remain focused on providing the technology, flexibility, and service excellence that will enable us to drive growth and long-term shareholder value. We're making tremendous progress throughout the business thanks to the dedicated efforts of our employees and credit them for positioning Blink to deliver a strong finish to an excellent year. We look forward to driving continued momentum as we move through 2022.
Now I'll turn the call over to Brendan Jones, President of Blink, to discuss more of our recent developments. Thank you.
Hey, good afternoon, everyone. It's a pleasure to speak with everybody today. As Michael indicated, we had a great year in 2021, and we're looking forward to having another great year in 2022. We've grown our business and our network through our proven ability to introduce innovative charging technologies, provide flexible sales models, and through our success winning valuable partnerships in strategic locations. Throughout 2021, we aggressively pursued and won multiyear contracts with a broad variety of well-respected commercial enterprise, healthcare facilities, planned communities, and municipalities. Slide eight provides a bit of an overview on some of our notable U.S. wins during calendar year 2021, which includes several municipal partners, such as partnering with the City of San Antonio to deploy 202 Blink-owned Level 2 charging stations and three DC fast chargers throughout the city.
We also are expanding Blink Mobility via our BlueLA car-sharing program with the City of Los Angeles. We will deploy and operate an additional 300 charging stations, bringing the total under program to 500 to be placed across 100 locations in Los Angeles. Additionally, we signed a five-year agreement with Greenlight Communities to deploy 58 Blink-owned charging stations within existing and future multi-family residential communities across Arizona. Additionally, following the close of the fourth quarter, we announced two significant new partnerships, an agreement with General Motors for the deployment of Blink chargers at GM dealerships across the U.S. and Canada, and a contract with Bridgestone Retail Operations to deploy chargers at select groups of their Firestone Complete Auto Care and Wheel Works service centers. These collaborations combine our industry-leading charging technology with trusted brands, providing drivers with reliable EV charging at trusted automotive locations.
In the case of GM, we're excited to provide the infrastructure to power GM's growing lineup of EV models. If you haven't seen or driven GM's new GMC HUMMER EV, it is a sight to see, and it's a pleasure to drive. We believe in collaborations with mainstream consumer brands, such as Bridgestone. They play an important role in bringing EV charging to a larger audience and, in turn, supporting the pursuit of widespread EV adoption in the U.S. Now, if we flip to slide nine, within the last 12 months, Blink has contracted, sold, deployed, or acquired over 11,000 chargers, both domestically and internationally, bringing the total charger count for the company to over 32,000 since Blink's inception.
We have a healthy mix of deployments in the United States and abroad, with 64% of total Blink chargers deployed in the United States and 36% deployed internationally, primarily in Europe through Blue Corner. In addition, as of the fourth quarter, Blink provided service to over 272,000 registered members and unique users throughout the world. As global consumers increasingly make the switch to electric vehicles, we are seeing steadily growing demand for our charging stations, and our network of chargers is expanding exponentially across the globe. Our industry is still in the very, very early stages. We expect the transition to EVs to continue to pick up momentum, increasing our opportunities in the marketplace and driving strong revenue growth both near and long- term for Blink.
If we flip to slide 10, it gives you a snapshot of our charging station deployments in key geographic locations throughout the United States and Europe. As we've noted on previous calls, we strategically identify our location based on several criteria, including EV concentration and driving habits, population and density figures, historic and forecasted driving patterns, and future market growth potential. In the fourth quarter, we've deployed charging stations across 49 U.S. states and territories. Look out, Alaska, we're headed your way as well. We did this through working with both local and state government agencies across the United States and also private industry. On the international front, we are primarily growing our charging footprint through our European subsidiary, Blue Corner. We believe Blue Corner offers us a strong platform from which we can expand our charging footprint in various countries throughout the world.
Now, if we turn to slide 11, I'm sure you're aware that this is an historic time for the EV and the EV infrastructure industries. The $1.2 trillion federal infrastructure bill includes an estimated $7.5 billion to be used for building the nationwide infrastructure to support the anticipated growth or the massive growth and adoption of electric vehicles. During 2021, Blink was awarded $26.5 million in grants and RFPs from several different states. As more state and local governments strengthen their commitment to EV use and recognize the need for EV charging to enable that use, we believe Blink has a tremendous opportunity to grow our leadership position as a partner of choice for EV charging projects and deployments.
Grants and rebates are an important tool for us, allowing Blink to expand our charging footprint across a larger geographic region with limited deployment expenses, which shortens the payback period, enhancing our return on investment. With the growing opportunities associated with grants and rebate activity, we have expanded our in-house grants and rebate team to focus on winning as many of these awards as possible, so Blink may capture increasingly available funds to widely deploy EV charging stations across the country. Wrapping up, we are very proud to have achieved significant sequential and year-over-year growth, resulting in record revenue for both the fourth quarter and for the full year 2021. Blink has consistently delivered deployment growth as well as increased product sales and service revenues. We are energized.
Pun intended, by the opportunities ahead of our company and our industry as the EV revolution continues to gain traction. I will now turn it over to our CFO, Michael Rama, to run through some of the specific results for the quarter and year-end. Michael, over to you.
Thank you, Brendan, and good afternoon, everyone. Turning to slide 13, total revenue in the fourth quarter of 2021 grew to $7.9 million, a record for the company, and an increase of 224% compared to the fourth quarter of 2020. In addition, fourth quarter revenues were up 24% over the third quarter of 2021, primarily driven by increased demand for our global EV charging infrastructure and higher service revenues. Product sales in the fourth quarter of 2021 were $5.7 million, an increase of 214% over the same period in 2020. As customers purchased greater volumes of our commercial chargers, DC fast chargers, and residential chargers, as well as revenues generated through our Blue Corner acquisition.
Fourth quarter 2021 service revenues, which consists of charging service revenues, network fees, and ride-sharing revenues, were $1.8 million, an increase of 271% compared to the fourth quarter of 2020. The year-over-year growth was primarily driven by greater utilization of our chargers, an increased number of chargers on our Blink Network, revenues associated with the Blink Mobility rideshare program, and revenues from the Blue Corner acquisition. We believe it makes sense to combine these three service line items into one amount to differentiate between the product and service aspects of our business, as this approach also aligns with our company's strategic goal of increasing the service component of our revenue mix and growing our recurring revenue base. In time, as EV adoption accelerates and utilization of our charging stations improves, we anticipate seeing a larger mix of revenues come from services.
Gross profit for the fourth quarter of 2021 was approximately $1.4 million, an increase of 223% over the same period in the prior year, and up 55% sequentially from the third quarter of 2021. We continue to look at ways to reduce our component costs, especially in light of the ongoing supply chain disruptions occurring globally. Operating expenses in the fourth quarter of 2021 were $20.5 million compared to $8.3 million in the prior year period. The increase year-over-year reflects our commitment to the expertise of our existing employees and to the hiring new talent in order to meet the ever-increasing demand of our products and services and to support current and expected growth.
We continue to strengthen our sales, operations, marketing, IT, and customer service functions, as well as growing our in-house grant and rebate program, as Brendan mentioned earlier, so we can capitalize on many EV infrastructure opportunities that lie ahead. Additionally, during the quarter, we recognized $8.3 million in higher share-based expense, mostly related to a special performance option equity award. I do want to reiterate that we will continue to invest in new technology and talent across the business, but will ensure expenses are closely watched. Last quarter, we began the practice of presenting adjusted EBITDA. Our management team believes this non-GAAP measure is useful in evaluating our company's core operating performance because it excludes items that are either significant non-cash or non-recurring expenses.
Adjusted EBITDA for the fourth quarter of 2021 was a loss of $9.1 million compared to a loss of $7.1 million in the prior year period, largely due to the higher operating expenses, as I just mentioned. As you can see, adjusted EBITDA loss as a percentage of revenues for the fourth quarter of 2021 improved 16 basis points compared to the third quarter of 2021 and improved by 174 basis points compared to the fourth quarter of 2020. Now turning to slide 14, you can see that both our revenues and gross profit have performed quite well over the last several quarters.
As we continue to expand our owner-operated strategy and experience greater demand for EV infrastructure and increased utilization rates, we believe we are well-positioned to drive significantly improved revenue and gross profit performance moving forward. Moving to our cash position. At December 31st, 2021, the company had approximately $175 million of cash compared to $22 million at December 31st, 2020. We believe we have sufficient cash on hand to fund our operations. We're pleased to have closed fiscal 2021 with record fourth quarter and full year revenue. We believe we're building a solid foundation for continued growth as we capitalize on the significant funding and focus being placed on the establishment of a robust EV charging infrastructure, both domestically and internationally. I will now turn the call back over to Michael Farkas for a few final comments.
Go ahead, Michael.
As I mentioned earlier, we began calendar 2022 with participation at CES, where we unveiled seven innovative next-generation products, which you see pictured here. With this new equipment, Blink strengthens its capabilities as the industry's only complete end-to-end solution for the EV charging ecosystem, powering electrification globally for consumers, fleets, businesses, retailers, developers, and municipalities. Our Blink Fleet Portal and the MQ200 help fleet managers ensure their vehicles have the opportunity to conduct planned charging efficiently at low cost and in a timely manner, so they are ready to roll when needed. The fleet market represents a tremendous opportunity given that there are approximately 250,000-plus commercial and government fleets operating more than 18 million vehicles in the U.S. alone.
Our Vision IQ 200, which we previewed on our last earnings call, features large, high-resolution screens that will allow Blink and its property owner partners to monetize locations immediately by generating advertising revenues. The DC Fast Wall 50kW combines superior speed in a smaller and lighter weight model that generates less heat. This model will be competitively priced to save customer costs. The HQ 200, which offers both basic and advanced options and internet connectivity so that the product can be managed through the Blink Charging mobile app. We believe we're coming into 2022 in a strong position with the people, technology, new products and strategy to drive growth and profitability. We're excited about what we're seeing in the marketplace, and we look forward to executing on the opportunities ahead. With that, we will now open the call for questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, the floor is now open for questions. If you have any questions or comments, please indicate so by pressing star one. We ask that in the interest of time, you ask only one question with one follow-up. Pressing star two will remove you from the queue should your question be answered. Lastly, while posing your question, please pick up your handset if listening on speakerphone to provide optimum sound quality. Please hold while we poll for questions. Okay, the first question is coming from Matt Summerville with D.A. Davidson. Your line is live.
Thanks. A couple of questions. First, can you talk about what you experienced in Q4 and what you're currently seeing from a supply chain logistics standpoint? You know, how much of a hit that may have been to revenue and margin, what type of impact you may have seen in the quarter, and how we should be thinking about this in the context of modeling out 2022.
Brendan, do you wanna grab that?
Yeah. We continue to monitor supply chains. As we know, all EV companies are being hit by supply chain constraints predominantly around components that are in short supply. In 2021, we managed to secure our supply, work with our two key suppliers to ensure that we had the product we needed for the sales we were achieving. We continue to work with them to make sure that we have alternate suppliers to ensure that they can build the chargers we need and the forecast we submitted at the end of Q3 last year. Now there's gonna be some disruptions. We're seeing what we'd call modest delays right now for the orders that we have.
Every single day, the major change is we're working supply and logistics on a 24-hour basis, where before, it was something that we didn't touch that frequently. There's a slight bit of price increase, mostly on the resourcing of components. It is nothing yet that is greatly impacting our margin. This is a work in progress. The situation continues to evolve, but we keep at it on a daily basis to ensure that our customers are gonna get their chargers in the requisite timeframe we've already committed to.
Just as a follow-up question, maybe can you guys comment, either numerically or at least qualitatively around what you're seeing in utilization rates both year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter, and how what you're experiencing is comparing to your own kind of internal expectations? Thank you.
We haven't been publishing.
I'll grab that.
Utilization rates. I'll let Michael expand on that. You know, what we do see is a direct correlation between you know, percentage of EV sales as of total fleet sales and utilization rates. Today, we're still in you know, single digits of total auto sales being EVs. Obviously, more EVs on the road, that's gonna impact utilization considerably. Michael, you may wanna follow up with that.
Yeah. As you can see.
Maybe you wanna add.
As you can see, the charging revenues have increased quarter-over-quarter this year, and it is a result of more chargers on our network, but also more driving going on. As the economies have opened up, we're seeing more usage, more utilization, and just a trend of, you know, increased usage. We're encouraged, and we're you know anticipating going into 2022 with a trend to continue as more EVs get on the road and more sales and more deployments are on our network.
Got it. Thank you, guys.
Okay. The next question is coming from Gabe Daoud with Cowen. Your line is live.
Hey, guys. Thanks for all the comments. I was hoping we could maybe start with the new product suite that was unveiled at CES. Just curious how the commercialization efforts are going, I guess. I know you brought on Amy to really push into the fleet channel. Curious if there's anything you can highlight there and just how maybe back to supply chain, how that's impacting the rollout of these new products.
Yes. I'll address it, Michael, if it's okay from the commercial perspective first.
Perfect.
we can jump in. Yeah, I will say going to CES, even though it was a lightly attended show and displaying those, the phones haven't stopped. Amy and her team are taking in accounts featuring our products and are now entering into several different RFPs and other business ventures to be able to get those products out. As we indicated in CES in our press announcement, those products, the MQ for the fleet market and the multifamily dwelling, the software platform and everything is being launched in Q2, so we're just a few months away from that. We anticipate sales at launch of those units, and as soon as we have news on contracts that have been signed, we are gonna be sure to make everybody aware of those.
We also have existing fleet customers that we're working to flip them over to the new software as well.
Thanks, Brendan. Maybe as a follow-up, obviously the momentum's been strong, another quarter with really nice revenue. Could you guys maybe just give us a sense of what your expectations are for 2022 on a revenue basis? Thank you.
Yeah, obviously. Hey, Gabe, nice to talk to you again. Yeah, we're
Hi, Michael.
You know, obviously, we don't come out with guidance, but as you could see, you know, we had a good trend in 2021, continuous growth. We're seeing the sales orders come in continuously, even in the first couple of months of 2022. We're encouraged we're gonna have a full year of Blue Corner under our belt for 2022. The expectation is revenues will continue to increase in a trajectory that we've seen similar to 2021. You know, obviously, we're encouraged going into 2022 with the activities we have established already in 2021, and we see that momentum carrying forward into 2022.
Okay, great. Thanks, Michael. Thanks, guys.
Sure.
Okay. The next question is coming from Sameer Joshi with H.C. Wainwright. Your line's live.
Yes. Thanks, Michael, for taking my question. So, from the very beginning, the strategy of the company has been on expansion, land grab, and you have been very successful in that. In the past, you talked about Greece and other countries in Europe as a potential location for expansion, and also countries in South America and Caribbean. Can you talk about briefly what these efforts are leading to?
Can you repeat the last part of your question? I couldn't hear you.
Yeah, just the status of your progress in non-Western, non-Northern Europe, that is, Greece, Italy, and other locations, and then also in South America.
Okay, excellent. You know, we are expanding through our acquisition with Blue Corner in Europe. We're making some headway obviously in Greece, and we are the largest EV charging provider in Greece today. We've also made a decent expansion in Israel, and we're looking at other countries in the Middle East to serve as well. In South and Latin America, we have some very strong partners that we work with that help us deploy infrastructure in their locations as well as doing this on our own. We have some very exciting things to discuss in regards to some of those expansion plans, and we'll keep you guys posted, you know, over the next several weeks and months in regards to our international expansion.
Just to follow up, in India, it seems that hub is mainly for software development. Is that also going to be a potential sales slash service kind of office, the one in Noida?
Yes. Our plan is to not only use it as a technology hub, but to also allow us to springboard into the local community and area to start providing EV charging infrastructure services.
Oh, okay. The new 43 employees that I think brings your headcount to 200 or more. What areas were these hires made in?
Do you want me to take that?
Do you want to take that?
Yeah, sure. As we've been talking about, you know, Blink heavily invested in 2021 in technology and, you know, we did that primarily to, you know, have a new technology stack, new software, new equipment, as we emerge into this period of rapid growth. The biggest uptick has been in technology and developers and engineers who are working to bring these products on board and then to service them over time. After that, there's been a strong uptick in personnel add to the sales team and the grants and rebates department, as is indicated by the $26.5 million that team won. We continue to increase that team, 'cause we expect better results from them as we move into 2022.
The last team we continue to add to as we expand and enter into new business models.
With now a lot more products than we had in 2020 than in 2019, there's an increase in AP and accounts receivable on Mike's side. Big adds across the board last but not least, we're building the fleet department, and we started with a strong area. Technology, then sales, then finance, and then on the periphery in grants and RFPs and fleet. Got it. Thanks. Thanks for taking my question.
Once again, if you have a question or a comment, please indicate so by pressing star one. The next question is coming from Stephen Gengaro from Stifel. Your line is live.
Thanks. Good afternoon, everybody. Two things from me, if you don't mind. The first is when we think about the gross margin trajectory, and I'm thinking about this probably primarily around the two biggest segments, right? The product side and then the charging side. How do you expect that to sort of evolve over the next, say, one to three years? Just kind of, not looking for 2022 guidance, but just sort of what's the evolution of those gross margins, and what are the biggest factors behind those moves?
I'll jump in that. Obviously, gross margins are obviously a big factor of our costs, right? As we're starting to see some pricing pressure with supply chain. We talked about a bit of pricing pressure with supply chain, where we had a slight sales increase in our product in the pricing model early in 2022. There is gonna be some pressures, we believe, on some of the margins on the product side. Even if you go over the next couple of years, you know, there could be some form of commoditization. We've talked about that. As you know, you know, being our operator, also selling the electricity. We're expecting, you know, margins on the electricity to be, you know, steady.
Again, between the two components, we're monitoring both ends of the business very carefully, you know, on the margin side, but we're seeing a little bit of the pressures on the product side, the cost side. Yeah, I'll just add.
Yeah, I'd like to add to that. Yeah.
Go ahead, Michael.
You know, we're in a business where the more we buy our goods, our electricity, the cheaper it gets for us. We're in a very enviable position where our margins could theoretically increase while keeping our prices to our customers steady. On the hardware side, I'm sure you guys have been hearing me for years, ultimately, there will be commoditization on the hardware and on the networking. It's inevitable. That's why Blink is always focused on the recurring side of the business, which is the sale of the electricity. Because of our long-term exclusive contracts, when we're in a location, again, it's not about a parking space. We have exclusive long-term rights to providing EV charging services at that address. If that place has five or six hundred parking spaces, those are all ours.
If you look at the legislation that's being passed globally, it's gonna be very difficult to buy an internal combustion engine car in five or 10 years from now. When you look at those parking lots and you may see one Blink charging station there today, you can assume that over the next few years, 20%-25% of those spaces are gonna need to be lit up with our charging stations. It really separates us from our competitors, like ChargePoint and others, where there's no commitment for those other locations. We're the only player where we have long-term exclusive rights to provide EV charging services of any and all kinds at that address.
Got it.
Brendan, do you want to add something?
That's helpful color, Michael. Thank you. The
You got it.
I know you don't wanna get in the business of guidance, but your year-over-year revenue growth was much more than that. You basically tripled revenue, right? You had Blue Corner. Do you think revenue doubles in 2022, give or take? Is that a reasonable benchmark or is that too aggressive?
I think it's a bit aggressive. It might be a bit aggressive. You know, you never know, but it seems to be a bit aggressive. We didn't think we were gonna accomplish as much growth as we did. The industry is just tremendous growth now. And we're gonna see some, you know, some of the Biden dollars, the $7.5 billion starting to circulate. So, we'd rather be a bit conservative, but you never know.
Agreed. Okay. No, thank you. Thanks for the color, gentlemen.
Okay. The next question is coming from Vikram Bagri from Needham. Your line is live.
Hi. Good evening, everyone. I was wondering if you can help us frame the GM opportunity, and I had a multi-part question on that front. GM, as you know, is working on their own charging hardware as well. I was wondering if you can highlight the advantages your solution has over theirs, and how will you approach this opportunity? Would you proactively contact the dealerships and get ahead of the competition? Would you wait for GM to push the product? And then when I look at longer- term, would you look for GM to recommend your charger to their customers and potentially sell your chargers through Bridgestone stores as well?
Okay. I think the biggest takeaway you need to have from the GM transaction is validation. GM vetted all of the equipment out there. We weren't the only ones. Every name that you could think of was competing for this project. We won because we have a better piece of equipment. It's that simple. The GM deal is us selling hardware. It's not us having recurring revenues off of the sale of electricity. We're in their dealership network, which is something that they need to protect as much as possible. They are causing their dealerships to buy our hardware and deploy it in their dealerships. One of the main reasons why is because of our focus on obsolescence and being averse to it. Again, there's a very different model in producing hardware that we have than any other hardware producer.
We're the only ones who actually own and operate the hardware in the field. We look at deploying hardware and having that hardware out there very differently than our competitors. I've said this a bunch of times. They look at their hardware as an iPhone, and we look at our hardware as a hot water heater. They want their customers to, you know, trade in that hardware or have upgrades quite often. As an owner and operator, we never wanna have to have an upgrade on the hardware because that costs us money. It's just a different philosophy, and because of it, we firm up our hardware much better than our competitors do.
Because to spend an extra $5 on this or $10 on that, and that allows that charging station to stay in the field much longer, that's to our benefit, but it's not to the benefit of our competitors who produce hardware. It's just a complete different philosophy in the development of the hardware, and because of that's the reason why we're not only at GM, CarMax, AutoNation, you go to Audi dealerships. This is the industry after vetting all the competitive products out there, them selecting us after that process. That's what the biggest takeaway on the GM contract should be. Bridgestone, there's gonna be many opportunities. Right now we're working on a pilot with them. It's more than a pilot.
We're actually doing deployments, but we believe that it's gonna grow from there, and ultimately they're gonna need to have charging infrastructure at all of their locations. I hope that answered your question.
No, that's very helpful. As a follow-up, I had sort of a housecleaning question. You mentioned that the grants in 2021 were $21.5. Can you describe how much of that was realized in 2021 versus how much will be realized in 2022? Another housekeeping on that front, you talked about hiring in Noida and building your teams in EU and expanding your fleet department after hiring of Amy. I was wondering, like, are you still in process of expanding the headcount? I'm asking that in regards to how should we expect the SG&A trajectory to evolve in 2022?
Okay. The first part of the question, I'll let Michael grab that one right after I answer the second part of the question. You know, as I stated earlier, you know, there was a benchmark of the 100,000th charging station installed last year in America. At the same time, you also heard me say that globally, by 2030, you're gonna need about 120 million chargers deployed globally. The U.S.'s number I'm hearing right now is between 15 and 20 million, but look at the number globally, 120 million chargers. We have maybe a few hundred thousand deployed globally. This industry is going through massive growth. The governments worldwide have decided that the future of mobility will be powered through electricity, and it will be EVs that are driving us globally.
That's where we are. In order for us to really properly handle that growth, our most valuable resource is human resources, is people. You can't automate all these processes that we have. This is an industry that's gonna be growing. It's supplanting one of the largest industries that we've had for the last hundred some odd years, which is the oil space. It's gonna take time. It's not happening overnight, but it's inevitable. That's where we are today. It's about us investing today to have the future that we wanna have tomorrow. That's where we are today. This industry is growing with us or without us. We hope it's gonna be with us, and that takes capital, and just massive investments now. Again, we don't wanna sell our future by selling the charging station. We'd rather own and operate that charging station.
I'm not sure if the people on this phone heard this, but British Petroleum, who owns both charging infrastructure assets and gas stations, came out and said they're making more money on their charging stations than they are on gas pumps in certain locations. This is not us saying this. This is British Petroleum. Again, it's just a matter of investing in those right locations, having that charging infrastructure available, having those long-term exclusive contract with those property owners, and that's exactly what we've done for the last 13 years. We positioned ourselves exactly for this time to develop the technology that's gonna be necessary and to make the investment in deploying the infrastructure that we own and operate. Now, Michael, if you could take the first part of the question, please.
No, I'll answer. So far, of the $26.5 million awarded to us in 2021, very little, a sliver, has been recognized. We recognized a shade under $200,000 of that. The expectations are many of these are bigger projects. They're gonna expand. We're working on a lot of these projects right now. We expect to see some of this revenue generated from the grants rebate in the latter part of 2022 and going into 2023. These are bigger, longer projects with regards to that. Again, very little of 2021 has been recognized.
Understood.
By the way, remember this is all before the Biden programs. The programs that we were just talking about, the $26 .5 million, these were leftovers from Obama and Trump days. That has nothing to do with the $7 5 Billion. That's gonna start really start to flow through the systems, you know, at the second half of this year and going forward.
Great. Is it fair to assume that the entire $26.5 will be realized in next two years?
Mm-hmm.
You know, I think I'll bring this closer to the projects on how long they go, but I think it's a two- to three-year project window. I think the majority will be in late 2022 into 2023, but you could have some trickling into 2024. Brendan, you might have a little more color on that.
Yeah. Based on the contracts and the terms associated with them, the majority, you know, we should get through by the end of 2023. We, you know, we get new ones every day, and we got new ones in Q4. You get the award, and then you have a little bit of a lead time on the actual consummation of the contract itself, and sometimes that's three to six months, which adds to the end date. You know, reasonably, yeah, we'll start seeing the revenue, as indicated, at the end of this year, and the bulk of what was won in 2021 throughout 2023 to come in with some tailing off, depending on the complexity of the product into later years.
Thank you very much, gentlemen.
Up next, we have Noel Parks from Tuohy Brothers. Your line is live.
Hi, good afternoon. I had a couple of things. I wondered if you could talk a little bit about the multifamily market. I wonder if you could just sort of characterize who are the earlier adopters, wondering if it's breaking out more by region, you know, suburban versus more urban core locations. Are there any patterns in that you can talk about?
The multi-family
Michael?
Residential market. Yeah, definitely. The multi-family residential market is an extremely important market for us, and we've developed hardware specifically for that market and back end for that market. Bottom line is if you have charging infrastructure at home, that's where you're charging. The data's just there. We are making tremendous efforts in that space, and it's not only having an apartment building with some subterranean parking garages or first-floor parking garages. We look at it from whether it's on-street parking in residential areas, whether it's mixed communities, or whether it's in dense urban areas where that same parking facility may be you know, parking people who work there during the day and who live there at night.
Any facility that has potential of residential charging on a multi-family basis, we're there, and we have the right hardware and the right back-end solutions to be really at the forefront of that space.
Great. I was wondering if you could just more broadly talk about how you see the state of hardware technology on the charging side now. Maybe just how it's advanced over the past year, in terms of, and I guess looking ahead, what features are there that are growing more in importance. Is, you know, between sort of DC fast charging and, say, Level 2 charging, is there any sort of divergence in terms of, you know, customer demand and as a result, you know, where, I guess, your development dollars need to be heading more for the near term?
We decided to look at the market and see where the massive amounts of charging is gonna be taking place. Without a question, if you look at all estimates and you look at the industry and where the market is, you're looking at about 85% or so of charging is gonna be done not on Superchargers. Most charging will not be done at very fast rates. Most people will plug in their car at night, once a week or so, and then be able to drive for the entire week. They'll wake up in the morning and their car will be fully fueled. There are tremendous opportunities for DC fast chargers as well.
What we wanted to do was make a very, very large impact on the Level 2 marketplace and really become a leader in that arena. After that, our goal was to do the same, what we did for Level 2s, to do for DC fast chargers. We have plans to do so, and just in the right time. We believe we'll have a very, very nice product mix, you know, above and beyond what we have today. Remember, we have every single type of piece of equipment that you could think of, whether it's a DC fast charger, Superchargers, all the way to a single-family home dedicated parking space. We have the Blink Network that can manage all of it.
It manages our hardware, proprietary hardware, and our charging network also manages most of our competitors' hardware. You could see a Tritium, you could see an ABB unit, you could see a BTC unit, you could see other units on our network. If you look at ChargePoint or FLO or SemaConnect or others, they don't do that. You know, we've looked at this industry and made sure, hey, no matter what, the most important thing for us is to analyze the space where we're deploying our hardware and making sure that the right piece of equipment is being installed in that location. If that location requires a Level 2 charging station, that's what we deploy. If that location requires a DC fast charger, that's what we deploy. We don't have any one specific product that we put in a location.
We see what's best for that location, and that's what we deploy. That's why being as fully vertically integrated as we are, it allows us to do so. It's about making sure the right solution is in that location. It's a different model than our competitors because they're selling a specific product.
Right.
We're selling a service, EV charging services. If we have to go out of our product pool in order to make sure that that location has the right piece of equipment, that's what we do because the Blink Network allows us to do so and still have a seamless network through our mobile application, through our web-based portal to manage and charge and operate all of those different charging stations along with ours. Obviously, we're gonna choose ours if that's the appropriate solution. Again, the most important thing is for us to make sure that that location has the right piece of equipment because ultimately, we're making our money off of the sale of electricity. Today, there's no question about it. We sell hardware, we sell networking services. When you talked about commoditization earlier, that's where you're gonna see that.
On our side of the business, when we're selling kilowatt hours, it's gonna be a whole different ballgame.
Great. Thanks a lot.
You're welcome.
I'd now like to turn the call back to management for closing remarks.
Okay, hold on. Just having some technical difficulties. To close the call, I'd like to emphasize in addition to all of the new technology we're currently rolling out, we actually have a lot more to come. Without giving too much away, we're very excited about the progress we're making on a new solution that's designed to integrate the highest levels of wireless communications, EV technology, and the gig economy. In short, this new solution represents the convergence of several aspects of digital communications, the gig economy, and e-mobility, and is expected to benefit each location that rolls this service out, and is particularly resourceful for disadvantaged communities in being able to provide digital equality in those areas. It's all I could say at this point, but please stay tuned.
At Blink, we pride ourselves on our ability to innovate, and we're excited on offering creative ways to bring cutting-edge EV charging technology to communities all over the country and throughout the world. Thank you for joining us. We are excited about the growing opportunities we're seeing to extend our footprint, grow our customer base, and establish new partnerships. We're particularly energized about introducing our new products to the marketplace. We look forward to speaking with you guys again soon. Thank you.
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. This does conclude today's conference call. You may disconnect your phone lines at this time and have a wonderful day. Thank you for your participation.