Who will own the Connected Customer?

A quiet revolution is taking place in the utility sector. Thanks to IoT networks and smart meters, many homes in Australia are now ready to become Connected Homes – smart automated and presumably more comfortable environments that cocoon us in web of responsive ICT connections.

The Connected Home market today includes:

• Solar + Storage Systems
• Utilities Management
• Security and Safety
• Smart Appliances
• Wellness Monitoring
• Smart Entertainment
• Automated Electric Vehicles

While the Connected Home market is still in its infancy, analysts put the global value of this market in the range of 50 to over 100 billion dollars within 5 years. Already the solar + storage industry is making inroads into this market. The vision for the solar-powered smart home is compelling. By combining rooftop PV with learning thermostats, web-connected appliances, energy monitoring software and battery storage, homeowners will soon have unprecedented control over their energy use. This means they can reduce their energy costs – potentially to zero. They can even sell their surplus to other customers for a profit.

The big question is who will own the Connected Customer’s gateway to the Connected Home services? This is important point because whoever owns it may be the conduit for all future Connected Home services including utility services.

Utilities always assumed they would have a good chance of owning the Connected Customer and they thought their main competitor would be the telcos and cable operators who also offer a smart home infrastructure. This was a fairly safe assumption until recently, when technology disrupter models like Uber showed that if you create a more convenient customer engagement pathway with cost saving attached, you can make fulfilment of the service secondary to the customer engagement strategy.

Another example is Telstra, who recently set up an Energy Service division offering solar and storage products. It’s headed by Ben Burge, previously CEO of online retail energy challenger Powershop.

In response, utilities are scrambling to design new products and business strategies that are aimed at boosting their customer value proposition.

Australian Utility Week – the Digital Utility expo is focused on this issue. It also outlines the progress of smart metering and the IoT network as it moves across the Australian and New Zealand customer markets as the core technology infrastructure that is required for the Connected Home.

The event will attract around 1500 participants and features 200 experts from the utility technology sector. It includes Australia’s top Smart Energy and Smart Water start-ups speaking alongside utility R&D professionals and utility executives.  This is the only event in Australia or New Zealand that is dedicated to the digital theme and its implications for the utility business model, ICT architecture and customer strategies.

Register your complimentary visitor pass* HERE

*Your complimentary visitor pass gives you access to 100+ exhibitors and 5 free sessions on the exhibition floor. Interested in attending as a delegate? Click HERE

For more information see – http://www.australian-utility-week.com/