1st Investment in the U.S. for GDF SUEZ New Ventures

An innovative platform

The open, cloud-based Energy Service Management (ESM) software platform developed by Tendril provides the infrastructure, analytics, and understanding required to optimize and personalize energy usage for individuals and small businesses. Tendril’ solution considers more than 300 data inputs to create a complete view of the energy consumer.

Adrian Tuck, Tendril’s CEO explains: “We sell our software to utilities who then use the software to improve their relationship with their customers by making energy more personal and more interactive for those customers. The Tendril ESM platform is unique in two ways. Firstly, it uses an underlying physics engine to make the energy calculations for every individual on the system. The second thing is that the platform is open . It means that utilities can ask third parties to develop new applications on top of the platform”.

A great development potential in Europe

According to Grzegorz Gorski, Executive VP Innovation and New Business at GDF SUEZ: “Tendril’s offer has a deeper, bigger potential of extension than other software due to an application of big data techniques and connection with external database”, he says, “It allows much deeper analysis and segmentation of customers’ behaviour regarding energy”.

Energy Service Management at the heart of Energy Transition

The energy industry is changing. There is also a change in consumer awareness with the emergence of the Ipod, Ipad generation who expects new products and services from their energy suppliers, and also regulatory changes, as utilities start to adapt to meet renewable standards. “Forward thinking utilities are moving away from being just suppliers of electrons to consumers, to becoming service providers providing a mix of different products and services to meet those consumers’ needs. Energy services management is the set of capabilities that those forward thinking utilities need in order to be able to provide individualised offerings to their consumers”, comments Adrian Tuck.“We do it for our customers, to increase the quality of our service, to increase their appreciation, their engagement, and finally, their loyalty towards us as the provider of their energy solutions” ads Grzegorz Gorski.

The GDF SUEZ / Tendril deal: a win-win international partnership

Tendril felt they needed a strong partner in Europe that could help them successfully customise and adapt their solutions to the European market. “Our search was for a utility which had a forward thinking view of their customers and the opportunities of new ways of engaging and interacting with those customers, where we could partner, take that knowledge and our tools and combine them to bring to market a very compelling solution for the different European markets”, says Adrian Tuck.

GDF SUEZ, through its investment fund, GDF SUEZ New Ventures, immediately saw synergies and development opportunities in this innovative and growing company. As Hendrik van Asbroeck, GDF SUEZ New Ventures’ Director puts it: “Tendril showed potential in the US to deliver additional services towards end customers. When we got in touch with Tendril, we saw straight away what a great opportunity it would be for us to use this kind of solution in energy but also in other markets. We will put Tendril in contact with our marketing and sales business units to jointly develop new value-added products and solutions.”

Both Tendril and GDF SUEZ see this deal as a win-win partnership. Tendril gains access to one of the leading energy providers in Europe and their customers - a fantastic way to enter the European market - and GDF SUEZ gets to partner with Tendril, develop and implement ESM solutions adapted to European markets to better serve their customers, while looking for more investment opportunities in the US. “Tendril is our first US investment, but certainly not the last, as we plan to open a small branch of GDF SUEZ New Ventures in the Silicon Valley in 2015”, says Grzegorz Gorski. “What I do hope is to implement Tendril solution in Europe. As to us, it will allow us to better serve our customers. That is the goal of any business”.

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