PACE Telematics' EIC Accelerator Car Data Cloud, 7 Years On

PACE Telematics GmbH, registered in Karlsruhe in 2015, set out to give old cars an internet connection. A small plug, the PACE Link, went into a car's diagnostic port and sent data to a cloud that independent workshops could read. In the EIC SME Instrument Phase 2 cut-off of 3 April 2019, the European Commission selected this "manufacturer-independent connected-car platform" for funding, according to the Commission's list of selected companies. CORDIS records an EU contribution of €2,070,512.50 towards a total cost of €2,957,875, a start on 1 September 2019 and a planned end on 31 August 2021. PACE Telematics is the only beneficiary listed for the project.

Seven years later the dongle no longer exists. PACE stopped making and selling the PACE Link in April 2022 and shut its cloud services for it at the end of that year, the company told its users. What survived is a feature the company added during the EU project: paying for fuel from a phone at the pump. That business now covers more than 14,000 stations, according to the company's website, and in April 2025 DKV Mobility, a fuel card group from Ratingen that had held a minority stake since 2020, agreed to buy all remaining shares, as PACE and Verkehrsrundschau reported.

A Payments Company Inside a Fuel Card Group

On 13 January 2026 PACE Telematics announced that it would operate as PACE Mobility GmbH and that the founders Robin Schönbeck and Philip Blatter were stepping down as managing directors, replaced by Julius Parrisius and Mike Kasperlik, both from the existing management. The company describes itself as "a company within the DKV Mobility Group", according to its press release and Transport Online. The register entries match: the new name was entered on 7 January 2026 and the management change on 8 January 2026, according to North Data.

The acquisition was announced on 4 April 2025, subject to regulatory approval, with no price disclosed. North Data lists a merger control review of DKV Mobility Group SE and PACE Telematics GmbH dated 2 April 2025. The date on which the deal closed has not been published. Later register entries show the shares moving inside the DKV group: in May 2026 NOVOFLEET Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH was entered as shareholder, and in July 2026 a profit transfer agreement with it was registered. Novofleet is a DKV subsidiary, according to a 2023 European Commission merger decision. PACE has stopped being an independent company in all but brand.

From a Diagnostic Port to the Fuel Pump

The funded technology addressed a gap in the car market. Most cars on the road in 2019 had no online connection, and those that did sent their data to the carmaker. The project's objective warned that carmakers were "positioned to create data and value silos" that would leave independent parts wholesalers and workshops behind. PACE's answer used the OBD II port, standard on cars since 1996: the PACE Link plugged into it and talked to the PACE Car app on the driver's phone, which passed data to the PACE Cloud. Drivers got a find-my-car function, a fuel-saving trainer and an emergency call; workshops got the engine error codes of their customers' cars through a dealer dashboard, the CORDIS results brief explains. Unlike a carmaker's own telematics, it worked across brands and on older cars.

Connected Fueling, the product that replaced it, needs no hardware in the car. The driver picks a pump in an app and pays by phone, and the fuel station's till system is linked to the PACE platform through an open interface the company calls OpenFSC. PACE's own PACE Drive app is one way in; fuel card issuers, other apps and carmakers can also plug in, and the payment can be started from Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, according to PACE's July 2024 release. DKV's App&Go digital fuel card runs on it, as Fleet World and PACE's April 2025 release report.

What the EIC Project Promised, and Where It Ended

The grant was meant to scale the workshop platform across Europe. In its periodic report, PACE writes that it improved the dealer dashboard, the PACE Car app and the cloud and developer hub, and started "a broad marketing and sales initiative to push for additional large pilot projects in other European countries outside of Germany". It then added the fuel payment layer to keep users engaged. The same report says the pandemic hit hard: "all of our potential B2B customers are in the automotive industry", and the momentum of late 2019 "was slowed down significantly during 2020". No large workshop pilot outside Germany is named in the report or in PACE's press releases.

CORDIS records that the project was "terminated on 23 December 2020", eight months before its planned end. The reason is not given, and how much of the €2.07 million was paid out is not public. The CORDIS records are also inconsistent: the published report is labelled as covering a second period up to 31 August 2021, after the termination date. PACE itself announced in January 2020 that it had "received 2 million euros", according to its press release; the release was published before the project was cut short. Two deliverables are listed on the results page, both user manuals: one for the PACE Car app and one for the dealer dashboard.

1. PACE Cloud and apps finishedDelivered"Fully completed during the project", CORDIS brief.
2. Large workshop pilots outside GermanyNot achievedNone named in the report or company news.
3. Full project termNot achievedTerminated 23 December 2020, reason not public.
4. Connected-car product on the marketPartlySold until April 2022, cloud closed at end of 2022.
5. Fuel payment layerDeliveredOver 700 German stations in early 2021, per the report and PACE.

Why the Dongle Went

PACE gave two reasons for ending the PACE Link: the supply markets of the previous two years, "including the semiconductor crisis", and "necessary decisions on our part regarding profitability", according to its April 2022 notice (translated). From 1 January 2023 its users could no longer reach the servers. The CORDIS results brief, published in March 2022, describes the turn from the other side: after the pandemic setback "the PACE team reprioritised, focusing on a connected fuel payment concept", and called PACE Drive "a success".

The connected-car idea did not come from nowhere. The car heater maker Eberspächer bought a stake of about a fifth of PACE in July 2018 to build cloud-connected vehicle services; Eberspächer's own release and S&P Global give the size slightly differently, as more than 20% and as 20%. Neither Eberspächer nor PACE has said publicly what came of those plans.

The Payment Network

The fuel payment business grew quickly once DKV joined. DKV Mobility bought a minority stake on 1 September 2020, with the amount undisclosed, according to PACE. In July 2021 the network passed 1,400 stations, with the first countries outside Germany added, according to PACE; by May 2022 it was over 3,000 in eight countries, a figure the CORDIS brief also gives. PACE passed 10,000 stations in 15 countries in July 2024, named Esso, JET, OMV and Tamoil among its partners, and counted 1.3 million users. In April 2025 PACE and Verkehrsrundschau gave 10,800 stations in 15 countries and more than 1.5 million app users. The website now shows 14,636 stations in 18 countries and 2.0 million users. All these figures come from the company; no independent count exists.

The company also moved into fleets. PACE Drive Business, a digital fleet card inside the app, launched with a free tier in September 2024 and a paid tier at €9.99 a month in February 2025, according to PACE and S&P Global.

What the Accounts Show

PACE Telematics files abridged accounts. For 2023 it reported a balance sheet total of €14,003,207 and 50 employees, and it is classed as a medium-sized company, according to Implisense, which draws on the filed accounts; the figures could not be checked against a second free source. North Data shows balance sheets from 2016 to 2024 and profit and loss accounts for 2022 to 2024, but behind a paywall. Revenue, results and the price DKV paid are not public. The company holds no EIC Fund equity: the award was grant only, and PACE does not appear on the EIC Fund's investment pages. CORDIS lists no other EU project for the company.

Why Europe Should Care

The problem the grant targeted is now written into EU law. The Data Act, Regulation (EU) 2023/2854, has applied since 12 September 2025 and gives drivers rights over the data their connected cars produce, including the right to share it with repairers and other service providers of their choice, as LKQ Europe and CMS describe the rules and the Commission's vehicle data guidance. PACE gave up its own route to that data three years before the law applied.

Its payment platform touches a different EU concern. A brand-neutral, German-built payment layer at the pump keeps fuel retail data with a European firm, now owned by a European fuel card group. The wallets running on top of it include US providers: PACE added PayPal in 2021, Apple Pay in 2022 and Google Pay in 2023, according to its press archive.

The Verdict

Neither PACE Mobility, DKV Mobility nor the EIC was asked for comment for this article. It is based on public records and published statements, linked throughout.