Octopus lines up Zopa founder to chair electric vehicles arm | Business News

The electric vehicles arm of Octopus Energy’s parent company is lining up one of the founders of Zopa, the British lender, to steer its expansion.

Sky News understands that Giles Andrews, who helped launch Zopa as a peer-to-peer lender in 2004, is to become chairman of Octopus EV.

Mr Andrews ranks among the biggest names in the British fintech sector, and also chairs Carwow, the online vehicle marketplace.

His appointment comes as the Octopus Energy empire headed by Greg Jackson continues its apparently inexorable growth to become one of the largest players in the British energy industry.

It recently announced the acquisition of Shell Energy Retail, a deal that will, once completed, see it become a credible challenger to British Gas, the market leader.

Earlier this year, Octopus EV secured a £150m funding boost to accelerate its growth amid rising demand for greener cars.

The division struck a deal with Pollen Street Capital, a private equity and credit firm, to provide financing to expand its salary sacrifice scheme.

The agreement took the total sum raised by Octopus Electric Vehicles in the past two years to £650m.

Its salary sacrifice offer helps drivers save up to 40% every month on new electric cars, providing the vehicle, charger and a discounted energy tariff.

The company also recently launched a personal leasing service direct to consumers to make it available to those whose employers do not offer salary sacrifice schemes.

The company has said its vehicles were saving more than 32,000 tonnes of CO2 annually – the equivalent of removing more than 11,500 fossil fuel cars.

Octopus EV, which says its fleet is worth more than £400m, counts McLaren, Nando’s and the property portal Zoopla among its clients.

It said earlier this year that it had been adding roughly 85,000 employees to its potential customer base each quarter.

OEV’s competitors include the likes of Zenith and LeasePlan.

It recently launched Octopus Electric Vehicles in the US.

Octopus has been contacted for comment.