In a Meet the Drapers episode, Bayan Mohammad, CTO of Y Black EV, presents the YPlug EV wireless inductive charging system. She introduces herself, highlighting a multicultural background, electrical engineering and MBA education, and involvement with UN Climate, Hershey, and the Royal Academy of Engineering, emphasizing a personal drive to help rural communities reduce CO₂ emissions. She outlines the current EV charging market pain points: only 500,000 chargers for 5 million EVs in Europe, average 50 km gaps between stations, lack of interoperability, high cost, and inflexibility. YPlug EV’s solution is a ground‑installed, portable, wire‑free inductive charging mat that automatically detects a vehicle, works with all EV and hybrid models, supports AC‑to‑DC conversion up to 240 V, and operates in all weather conditions. The system claims 96 % charging efficiency, 50 % lower cost than competitors, and fast, safe operation. The business model combines direct hardware sales with a recurring $5 per unit per month subscription for a mobile‑app data service that locates nearby chargers. The team seeks strategic partners to scale, especially in Saudi Arabia where 5,000 charging stations are being built, and envisions applications for autonomous vehicles that could charge during brief stops. Tim Draper and other panelists probe the technology’s uniqueness, revenue generation beyond one‑time sales, and go‑to‑market strategy, prompting discussion of competitive advantage, hardware sustainability, and market adoption.
Chapters
I'm Bayan Mohammad, the CTO of Y Black EV. We are trying to shape the future of e-mobility worldwide to benefit the environment. My dad told me when I was a kid, maybe totally different than other kids, when he's buying like a car toy, supposed to be play with it, have fun. No, for me, I don't like reverse engineer. I have tickets out to discover what's inside the car, to see the materials, to understand how each piece or chip inside the car working, something like that. Half Georgian, half Italian. School degree, then got my electrical engineering from States and got my MBA in finance. When I was at school, I'm already engaged in many social matters to help a lot of people, especially in rural areas. I'm a fellow at UN Climate and even for Hershey in States and Royal Academy of Engineering in London. Being fellow at those organizations, they focusing on sustainability solutions, patented solutions that can help more people. So I have kind of something inside me to help more people, especially in rural areas. That's why once we're going to find out the EV cars and all solutions related to EV cars, we're going to avoid or minimizing the CO2 emission is going to be like an average 5 million metric tonnes per year. The most important things to help your community, to help your around, So that's why the idea started from those to scale to all rural areas. Since I've been many times leader for many projects, even when I was a kid, so that gives me a talent and motivation, even me an experience how to lead your company for this matter. At the beginning, it's not easy to have a team from different countries. We have African people, European people, American people, so different civilization, different mentality, different cultures. So when you talk to them as a friendly way, as one family, they feel comfortable to give you feedback about your work, to give you feedback about your direction. We, we listen to each other. Yeah, I'm already a risk taker from childhood. That's why my father supported me for this matter. When you believe in your idea and believe in yourself, it's like a motivation for you to succeed and get many opportunities.
Viewers, usually I'm pretty easy to reach. I mean, there are only 300 million of you. I'm making it a lot easier for you to contact me. I have downloaded my brain into this digital twin, and you can scan this QR code. You can pitch me your idea. You can talk about your business. Anything, and I'll answer it 24/7. Enjoy it. It's great. It's a new feature of Meet the Drapers and Draper TV. I think you're gonna have some fun. Thank you.
Yeah, the culture—they are so generous, so friendly. They are welcoming you and easy to convince them and increase awareness about our new technology. Yeah, actually I like their food so much, especially for the Saudi coffee with the dates. So especially, especially at morning, and they are friendly, easy to to talk and engage them. The potential is huge. Even, even the managing and building this kind of events, it gives you an insight and indication that it's going to be a huge market, a huge economy, and scaling and booming in future. I used to pitch in African states. You have to be self-confident. You have to be prepared, knowing what you are doing, something like that. Give us your pitch. Only 500,000 chargers are installed in Europe compared to 5 million EVs. Low availability. The average distance between charging stations is 50 km and more. Inconvenience. Hard to find one charger for all types of EV models and charging stations. High cost and lack of flexibility. Those are the roadblocks for e-mobility. That's why we created YPlug EV. The solution is efficient, fast, and wireless charger can be integrated with all types of electric and hybrid vehicles and charging stations. No need to use any kind of wire, long-life battery, portable. You can use it anywhere. And no need to do any kind of plug-in. We avoid any kind of wire. Just detects automatically once the car above. There is inductive charger. Once the car above, there is transmitter on the bulk space and receiver above the vehicle.
So it needs to be installed somewhere on the ground?
Yeah, installed somewhere on ground.
Actually a stable one. You don't plug it into the car.
No need to be infrastructure or something like that.
Got you, got you.
So you just put it on the top. There has to be a plug that charges plugs into that.
Yeah, that's just when the battery empty.
Sorry, is that some special kind of plug that or can I just plug it into my regular?
You can plug it in from AC to DC. We truncated the fluctuation of electricity and compatible with two forty volts. And nowadays, Saudi Arabia they are working to have five thousand charging stations.
I mean, you are not the first that is doing this like inductive charging if this is the correct term in English, right? What is your competitive advantage? What's your advantage with other players who do similar things?
We are more efficient than others with accuracy 96%, compatible all kinds of EV, hybrid, and charge stations, affordable compared to other competitors by 50%. It's fast, easy to use, friendly, portable, safe in all weather conditions.
Once everybody's got one of these mats on their garage, what do you do next? How do you build this into a big business?
We are looking to scale to stage.
That's why we're looking for strategic partner, help us to have a potential for scaling more. And since most of money spent on production, I didn't send the message in correct way regarding business model that we already had what he already mentioned.
How do you continue making money as the charge is happening rather than a one-time actually transaction?
We are working to develop our model in, in addition to direct selling. To have recurring revenue based on paying $5 per unit per month to access to data that's connected to mobile app to find nearby charging stations. Terrific.
So thanks so much for being on Meet the Drapers. It's a pleasure. Thank you so much. Nice to see you.
Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much.
At home for charging, it's not too much of a hassle for me to just plug it in. That's easy. But where I really see this kind of inductive charging be like a huge thing is with autonomous vehicles. In every stop, maybe you stop only like 1 minute, but you get some like, you know, let's say 1 kilowatt or like a few kilowatts or kilowatt-hours energy. That would be really big. So in a way, the technology is definitely needed. There is many players in the market who do something similar.
What worries me in general about hardware in particular, you know, is that piece, the transactional piece, and then what's next. I would love to know why the customers that bought it here or other purchased it. Is it because they haven't seen competition? They haven't met the others? Were you the first that talked to them? Were you a good salesperson that had a great team? And that's why you actually— would that sustain over the long term, right? So I think go-to-market strategy, again, I would love to know, is that a first time, you know, or a first mover advantage, or this is something that's going to continue?
