PARIS & ARNHEM, the Netherlands & NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Allego N.V. (“Allego” or “the Company”) (NYSE: ALLG), a leading pan-European electric vehicle charging network, announced that its ordinary shares and warrants will begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange today, March 17, 2022, under the symbols “ALLG” and “ALLG.WS,” respectively. Allego’s listing follows the previously announced completion of Allego’s business combination with Spartan Acquisition Corp. III (“Spartan”).
Allego’s management will participate in an opening bell ceremony at the New York Stock Exchange today at 9:30 am ET to celebrate the public listing.
“It is a tremendous honor to bring Allego to the public markets, a company that’s integral to the electric vehicle industry and creating a cleaner world,” said Mathieu Bonnet, Chief Executive Officer of Allego. “The electric vehicle future has arrived, and we are proud to be at its forefront, providing critical infrastructure for EV drivers. Since our founding, we have experienced tremendous growth, and the demand for effective and convenient charging services increases each day. As a public company, we’re confident we have the right strategy, team and capital to continue meeting the needs of the expanding EV market.”
Bonnet continued, “I want to thank the entire Allego team and our partners at Spartan for their hard work and dedication throughout this process. Going public validates Allego’s innovative technology, effective business model that has led to a strong backlog, and our exemplary team endeavors. We look forward to supporting electrification as a public company in Europe, where there is significant momentum in EV sales.”
“Allego is a leading EV infrastructure business in a massive market that’s still in the early innings of electrification,” said Olivia Wassenaar, Head of Sustainable Investing at Apollo. “Allego’s steady growth across Europe and marquee partners are testaments to its superior network and variety of charging solutions.” Corinne Still, Apollo Partner, added “At Spartan and Apollo, we are committed to investing in growing businesses focused on decarbonization, and are pleased to support Allego as a public company.”
“We at Meridiam are proud to be at the forefront of EV charging investment, and to have supported Allego’s pan-European expansion,” said Julien Touati, Vice Chair of the board of Allego and Partner at Meridiam, Allego’s majority owner. “Our investment in Allego represents Meridiam’s commitment to sustainability and the energy transition. Today we are especially pleased to witness Allego enter the public markets, and we are fully committed to supporting Allego’s future efforts to electrify Europe.”
Company Overview
Founded in 2013, Allego is a leading electric vehicle, or EV, charging company in Europe and has deployed over 28,000 charging ports across 12,000 public and private locations, spanning 16 European countries. In 2018, the Company was acquired by Meridiam Group, a global long-term sustainable infrastructure developer and investor, which provided the necessary capital to expand Allego’s existing global network, services, and technologies. The Company’s charging network includes fast, ultra-fast, and AC charging equipment. The Company takes a two-pronged approach to deliver charging solutions, providing an owned and operated public charging network with 100% renewable energy and charging solutions for business-to-business customers, including leading retail and auto brands. The Company’s demanding solutions business provides design, installation, operations, and maintenance of chargers owned by third parties.
Allego’s chargers are open to all EV brands and able to charge light vehicles, vans, and e-trucks, promoting increasing utilization rates across Allego locations. Allego has developed a rich portfolio of partnerships with strategic partners, including municipalities, more than 50 real estate owners, and 15 OEMs. As other fleets shift to EVs, Allego expects to leverage its expansive network of fast and ultra-fast chargers to service these customers, which see above-average use rates.
Allego’s proprietary software suite, developed to help identify and assess locations and provide uptime optimization with payment solutions, underpins the Company’s competitive advantage. Allamo™ allows the Company to add premium charging sites to its network by analyzing traffic statistics and proprietary databases to forecast EV charging demand using over 100 factors, including local EV density, driving behavior, and EV technology development. This allows a predictable, cutting-edge tool to optimize those locations that are best positioned for higher utilization rates.
Allego EV Cloud™ is a sophisticated customer payment tool that provides essential services to owned and third-party customers, including authorization and billing, smart charging and load balancing, analysis, and customer support. This service offering is integral to fleet operators’ operations and enables the Company to provide insight and value to the customer and drive increased margins through third-party service contracts and operational and maintenance margins.
Recent Operating and Strategic Initiatives:
-
Allego plans to open 120 new fast-charging EV stations across the Netherlands and Belgium and separately secured 13 additional ultra-fast charging locations along major highways in Flanders, Belgium. Additionally, the Company entered a partnership to install ultra-fast charging locations in France.
Allego expanded its existing partnership with Van der Valk VDC, a prominent European hotel group, to offer fast charging facilities at over 50 hotels across the Netherlands and Belgium. (October 8, 2021)
In a project co-financed by the European Union and the Flemish Agency for Roads and Traffic, Allego expects to install 28 ultra-fast charging stations by the end of this year and double it to 56 ultra-fast stations by the middle of 2024. (January 20, 2022)
The Company plans to build five ultra-fast charging locations near one of France’s highly trafficked A355 Motorways, with over 28,000 individual vehicles utilizing the road each day. (January 21, 2022)
-
Allego entered into a strategic partnership with Nissan.
Spanning 16 countries and across more than 600 locations, Allego plans to install, operate, and maintain DC fast charging solutions of 50kW and 24kW. The partnership provides the full scope of charge point operations services for Allego DC charging hardware at Nissan dealer charging networks with five-year service and maintenance contracts for each charger. (December 2, 2021)
-
The Honorable Jane Garvey was appointed Chairwoman of the Board of Allego.
Upon the closing of the business combination with Spartan, Ms. Garvey, Chair of the Supervisory Board of Meridiam and the 14th Administrator of the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), assumed the role of Chairwoman of the Board of Directors of Allego N.V., the combined company. Ms. Garvey served under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. (November 30, 2021)
-
Allego expanded its partnership with REWE Nord to build hundreds of new charging locations across Germany.
The partnership extension aims to increase the number of fast charging to over 100 locations within the REWE Nord network from the initial 14 fast-charging locations established in 2018. REWE Nord is the leading food retailer in Germany. (November 16, 2021)
In addition to Ms. Garvey, who now serves as Chairwoman, the Board of Directors of the newly public company includes: Mathieu Bonnet, CEO of Allego; Julien Touati, Partner and Corporate Development Director at Meridiam; Sandra Lagumina, Partner and Deputy Chief Executive Officer at Meridiam; Julia Prescot, Partner and Chief Strategy Officer at Meridiam; Christian Vollman, entrepreneur and angel investor; Thomas Josef Maier, a director on the Regional Advisory Board of Meridiam Infrastructure Europe and Eastern Europe; Patrick Sullivan, Partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP from 1993 until his retirement in 2020; and Ronald Stroman, member of the United States Postal Service Board of Governors.
Transaction Overview
As a result of this transaction, the Company will receive approximately $161 million of gross proceeds, including from a private placement (“PIPE”) of ordinary shares anchored by strategic partners Fisker and Landis+Gyr as well as institutional investors, including funds and accounts managed by ECP. Investment funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management, Inc., which also sponsor Spartan, and by Meridiam, as long-term owner of Allego, also participated in the PIPE.
Meridiam, the existing shareholder of Allego, will roll 100% of its equity and, together with management and former advisors, will own approximately 74 % of the combined entity. Meridiam will continue to be a long-term strategic partner to the combined company.
Advisors
Credit Suisse served as sole financial advisor and capital markets advisor to Allego. Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, and NautaDutilh served as legal advisors to Allego. Barclays served as sole financial advisor and capital markets advisor to Spartan. Credit Suisse and Barclays served as co-lead placement agent on the PIPE offering. Citi and Apollo Global Securities served as co-placement agents. Cowen served as Capital Markets Advisor to Spartan. Vinson & Elkins L.L.P. served as legal advisor to Spartan. Latham & Watkins LLP served as legal advisor to the placement agents.
About Allego
Allego (NYSE: ALLG) delivers charging solutions for electric cars, motors, buses, and trucks for consumers, businesses, and cities. Allego’s end-to-end charging solutions make it easier for businesses and cities to deliver the infrastructure drivers need, while the scalability of our solutions makes us the partner of the future. Founded in 2013, Allego is a leader in charging solutions, with an international charging network that comprises more than 28,000 charge points operational throughout Europe – and proliferating. In 2018, the Company was acquired by Meridiam, a global long-term sustainable infrastructure developer and investor, which provided necessary capital to enable the expansion of Allego’s existing global network, services and technologies. Our charging solutions are connected to our proprietary platform, EV-Cloud, which gives our customers and us a complete portfolio of features and services to meet and exceed market demands. We are committed to providing independent, reliable, and safe charging solutions, agnostic of vehicle model or network affiliation. At Allego, we strive every day to make EV charging easier, more convenient, and more enjoyable for all.
About Meridiam
Meridiam was founded in 2005 by Thierry Déau, with the belief that the alignment of interests between the public and private sector can provide critical solutions to the collective needs of communities. Meridiam is an independent investment Benefit Corporation under French law and an asset manager. The firm specializes in the development, financing, and long-term management of sustainable public infrastructure in three core sectors: sustainable mobility, critical public services and innovative low carbon solutions. With offices in Addis Ababa, Amman, Dakar, Istanbul, Johannesburg, Libreville, Luxembourg, New York, Paris, Toronto and Vienna, Meridiam currently manages US$18 billion and more than 100 projects to date. Meridiam is certified ISO 9001: 2015, Advanced Sustainability Rating by VigeoEiris (Moody’s), ISO 37001 Anti-Corruption certification by AFNOR and applies a proprietary methodology in relation to ESG and impact based on United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Forward-Looking Statements.
This communication includes “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the “safe harbor” provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are provided for illustrative purposes only and are not intended to serve as, and must not be relied on by any investor as, a guarantee, an assurance, a prediction or a definitive statement of fact or probability. Allego’s actual results may differ from their expectations, estimates, and projections and, consequently, you should not rely on these forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. Words such as “expect,” “estimate,” “project,” “budget,” “forecast,” “anticipate,” “intend,” “plan,” “may,” “will,” “could,” “should,” “believes,” “predicts,” “potential,” “continue,” and similar expressions (or the negative versions of such words or expressions) are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements include, without limitation, Allego’s expectations with respect to future performance and anticipated financial impacts of the business combination. These forward-looking statements involve significant risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ materially, and potentially adversely, from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements. Most of these factors are outside Allego’s control and are difficult to predict. Factors that may cause such differences include, but are not limited to: (i) changes in domestic and foreign business, market, financial, political, and legal conditions; (ii) risks related to the rollout of Allego’s business strategy and the timing of expected business milestones; (iii) the inability to obtain or maintain the listing of Allego’s ordinary shares on the New York Stock Exchange; (iv) risks related to political and macroeconomic uncertainty; (v) the risk that the operating and strategic initiatives described in this communication are delayed or do not occur at all; (vi) the risk that the benefits to Allego of the operating and strategic initiatives described in this communication are delayed, are less than anticipated or do not occur at all; and (vii) the impact of the global COVID-19 pandemic, including its impact on any of the foregoing risks. The foregoing list of factors is not exclusive. Additional information concerning certain of these and other risk factors is contained in Allego’s most recent filings with the SEC and in the registration statement on Form F-4 (the “Form F-4”), including the proxy statement/prospectus forming a part thereof filed by Athena Pubco B.V. in connection with the business combination on September 30, 2021, as amended on December 14, 2021, January 18, 2022 and February 1, 2022. All subsequent written and oral forward-looking statements concerning Allego, the transactions described herein or other matters and attributable to Allego or any person acting on their behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by the cautionary statements above. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance upon any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made. Allego expressly disclaims any obligations or undertaking to release publicly any updates or revisions to any forward-looking statements contained herein to reflect any change in their expectations with respect thereto or any change in events, conditions, or circumstances on which any statement is based, except as required by law.
