Berlin-based startup Cariqa has secured €4 million in seed funding to rebuild the fragmented EV charging payments ecosystem in Europe. The oversubscribed round was co-led by Contrarian Ventures and Anthemis Group, with support from Anthemis Female Innovators Lab, Earth, Golden Egg Check, and Techstars.
Cariqa aims to replace today’s inconsistent, opaque EV charging experience with a unified, transparent infrastructure — giving charge point operators (CPOs) full control of pricing and payments while offering drivers predictable costs, regardless of how or where they charge.
Already trusted by operators like Pfalzwerke, EWE Go, Qwello, Mer, and Q1, the company plans to expand its team, integrate with additional operators and vehicle makers, and scale across Europe.
EV drivers in Europe currently face a confusing maze of apps, cards, QR codes, and wildly varying prices — sometimes as many as 50 different tariffs at a single station, depending on payment method.
Behind the scenes, operators struggle too, burdened by outdated billing tools, dozens of integrations, and a loss of pricing control to third-party intermediaries. This complexity not only frustrates drivers but also erodes operators’ profits and slows EV adoption.
Cariqa’s CEO Issam Tidjani captures the problem well: “Imagine walking into a supermarket and finding that the price of milk changes depending on whether you pay by cash, card, or which bank you use - no one would accept that. Yet in EV charging, this kind of pricing inconsistency is still the norm.”
Cariqa offers Europe’s first full-stack EV charging payments platform, designed from the ground up for this specific use case. It empowers CPOs to fully control the transaction, ensuring compliance, consistent pricing, and direct payments from drivers — without middlemen inflating costs.
The platform includes:
By creating a single, transparent infrastructure layer, Cariqa enables operators to optimize revenue and deliver a reliable, clear experience to drivers.
As Europe’s EV infrastructure matures, physical buildout is no longer the main bottleneck — interoperability and trust are. With AFIR (Alternative Fuels Infrastructure Regulation) mandating transparent, direct pricing and access by 2024, the market is primed for a solution like Cariqa’s.
This regulation drives a shift away from closed networks and toward open, operator-controlled payments. Cariqa meets this demand by removing intermediaries and supporting compliance out of the box — unlocking scalability for operators and confidence for drivers.
Cariqa’s founding team — Issam Tidjani (CEO), Tamara Ciullo (CCO), Stefano Bonetta (CTO), and Mario La Pergola (COO) — brings expertise from HERE Technologies, Microsoft, GoCardless, and Virtuo. Their vision is not just to improve usability but to rebuild the transactional backbone of EV charging at the protocol level, ensuring resilience, transparency, and profitability for operators while delivering fairness to drivers.
They are tackling a critical piece of the energy transition: public EV charging, a sector responsible for a significant share of transportation emissions. With their systems-level thinking and deep understanding of payment infrastructure, the team has positioned Cariqa to lead the next phase of Europe’s EV rollout.
