Industry expertise: Utilities

Patterns of energy and water consumption are changing. New legislation requires investment in infrastructure and renewable sources, and new start-ups are upsetting the status quo. Investing in digital innovation will enable businesses to cut costs, improve efficiencies and remain competitive.

Consumers are becoming more demanding, and their expectations are being driven by what they’ve seen in other sectors. They want a personalised, omni-channel experience. Connective technology solutions can give your customers greater visibility and control, and provide you with a competitive edge.

The rise of ‘prosumers’ – people who store and sell their own energy – is taking absolute distribution power away from providers. But energy companies are generating more power from sustainable sources and moving to smaller generator hubs nearer the point of consumption. Smart distribution and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies will make it easier for you to monitor the health of mission-critical networks, and find and fix problems before they escalate.

Recent legislation has helped make the utilities sector a safer place to work. Mobile and collaborative technology can help monitor and protect lone workers, as well as giving field engineers full sight over every job. And IoT and smart devices give your organisation visibility over your physical and virtual infrastructure, protecting your assets and giving the real-time information needed to get more value from their usable life.

The younger generation has grown up using the Internet and mobile, collaborative technology – and they want to use similar consumer-grade tech at work. The industry must adopt these technologies to attract and retain ambitious talent.

More utilities companies are moving towards business models based on the collection and analysis of data. This gives them insight into everything from demand management to customer preference, enabling smarter and faster decision-making based on facts rather than assumptions.