Tendril and Itron Partner to Smarten the Smart Grid
February 3, 2009
Agreement will provide tight integration over OpenWay© by Itron and allow Itron to resell Tendril TREE
San Diego, CA – DistribuTECH 2009 – February 3, 2009 – Tendril, a leading provider of demand-side residential energy management solutions for the utility industry, and Itron, a leading technology provider to the global energy and water industries, today announced that they have entered into a formal integration and reseller agreement that will extend the reach of the Tendril Residential Energy Ecosystem (TREE) and provide seamless integration with OpenWay.
The agreement will leverage the strength of Itron’s industry-leading sales force, which generated more than $1 billion in business in North America during 2008, and allow them to resell Tendril’s industry-leading TREE energy management solution to utilities and energy retailers nationwide. Tendril TREE integrates with OpenWay by Itron to support energy management and conservation products and programs. OpenWay is emerging as the advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) solution of choice for measuring, and ultimately managing, energy usage in the 21st century.
The program also includes all points of contact and integration with the TREE Platform, including meter and AMI backhaul technologies, Home Area Network (HAN) device manufacturers, utility billing and customer care systems and other third-party energy management service providers.
“We are very excited to be able to leverage the expertise of the Itron sales force as we continue to extend the reach of our TREE system,” said Adrian Tuck, CEO, Tendril. “The years of experience that Itron has selling to utilities and energy retailers makes them an invaluable asset to Tendril.”
“We’re pleased to work with Tendril to offer utilities and their customers exciting, new ways to manage and conserve energy,” said Russ Vanos, Itron vice president of marketing. “Our work with Tendril proves that the interoperability and extensibility of the OpenWay architecture enables a smarter energy system.”
About TREE
The TREE Platform is an enterprise-class energy management software solution for utilities and energy retailers. Designed to support multiple energy management applications simultaneously, including energy efficiency, demand response and pricing, TREE provides a complete solution that is scalable, unified and optimized for seamless integration with the Utility back-office, a variety of meter networks, and ZigBee® enabled devices.
The TREE platform is the first unified energy management platform with an open, standards-based architecture that can scale to support millions of homes and their smart energy devices. The platform’s open set of APIs allows for seamless integration with new user interfaces and existing back-office enterprise systems, including meter management and billing systems, as well as load-monitoring and security applications.
The TREE platform can be accessed by consumers in various ways including, the energy management Web portal, mobile devices, an energy management widget, smart thermostats, and smart in-home displays. These devices provide access and information about the other devices in the Home Area Network (HAN) as well as details on their energy consumption and billing information. The utility back-office portal provides energy retailers with the ability to monitor and manage millions of HANS simultaneously, and communicate directly with their customers regarding service and support in real-time.
About Itron OpenWay
Itron’s OpenWay system is the foundation for smart metering and supports smart energy transmission and distribution grids by providing a two-way communication network between the utility and each meter. OpenWay provides interval data collection, time-of-use metering, load limiting remote disconnect and reconnect, outage detection, net metering capability and ZigBee® home area network connectivity, which empowers all customers to participate in energy management and conservation.
About Tendril
Tendril enables true 21st century energy efficiency by establishing a dialog between consumers and their energy providers. The Tendril Residential Energy Ecosystem (TREE) is comprised of an open, extensible and standards-based platform for energy management, a comprehensive suite of energy management applications (like Demand Response and Time-of-Use Pricing) and a suite of in-home hardware devices (like thermostats and outlets). TREE is a comprehensive and consumer-centric solution that is designed to integrate seamlessly with a Utility’s or Energy Retailers’ existing back office applications and network infrastructure allowing consumers and their energy companies to communicate, collaborate and create — Smart Energy for Life™. For more information, visit tendrilinc.com.
About Itron
Itron Inc. is a leading technology provider to the global energy and water industries. Itron Inc. consists of Itron in North America and Actaris outside of North America. Our company is the world’s leading provider of metering, data collection and utility software solutions, with nearly 8,000 utilities worldwide relying on our technology to optimize the delivery and use of energy and water. Our products include electricity, gas and water meters, data collection and communication systems, including automated meter reading (AMR) and advanced metering infrastructure (AMI); meter data management and related software applications; as well as project management, installation, and consulting services. To know more, start here: www.itron.com.
Media Contacts:
Marie Bahl for Tendril
303.468.4445
mbahl@tendrilinc.com
Steve Propper for Blanc & Otus
415.856.5114
spropper@blancandotus.com