Peri's GridMax implements rate
structures, crunches data
Newark, NJ - based
software firm Peri offers “custom software that will help utilities deploy new
rate structures -- and, just as important, integrate this data and analytics
into their back office systems,” Tim Maurer, the firm's new energy practice VP,
told us last week.
Peri calls its suite of
products and services GridMax and sells them to utilities, commercial and
industrial accounts, municipal buildings, schools and universities.
They include two-way,
wireless meters and an encrypted, cloud-based backhaul application that feed
utilities near real-time data on power use, demand, outages and more.The firm
focuses on helping customers to digest information about their power use and to
turn off electricity-using devices when prices are high.
The utility can use the GridMax MDMS, a cloud-based system that
Peri maintains -- and its analytics, to mine data. That real-time data, when integrated into the
utility's back office systems, can help them separate users into different rate
classes and deploy their choice of rate structures, including TOU pricing,
critical peak pricing and real-time pricing.
Real-time data can also
help utilities curtail load and manage budgets. It's not necessary for utilities to
buy the complete GridMax system to benefit, Maurer said.
The six individual GridMax
products employ technology standards like Open ADR and SEP 2.0 that make them
compatible with other vendors' products. Peri also serves as an IT
organization, advising utilities on how to integrate products from multiple
vendors.
For example, a utility
recently worked with Peri to integrate data from eight million meters in a
large western
“We can help utilities
integrate and scale whatever they need -- at whatever stage of smart grid
evolution they're in,”Maurer maintains.
Maurer would not share specific pricing information with us, saying only
that privately held Peri “can be very competitive because we can be a one-stop
shop. We operate in the cloud and
manufacture our own devices.”
Peri has grown to 1,000
workers since it was founded in 1999.
The firm is profitable, Maurer said, declining to be specific. The firm has offices in
To scale up the smart
grid, more will need to do so -- because of what's in it for them. Peri works with owners of commercial
buildings to install systems that harvest power use data, integrate it with
data on pricing and DR options and feed all of the data into a building's
automated controls, all in real time. It
is all in the name of cutting power use and power bills.
Similarly, Peri works with
utilities to provide homeowners with hardware and software that respond to the
utility's demand signals by controlling thermostats and energy-guzzling
appliances like water heaters.
Peri will continue to work
with rate payers to “deploy solutions that offer immediate payback,” Maurer
said. As dynamic pricing takes hold,
customers' rates will better reflect the true -- and fluctuating -- cost of the
power they use. But to get people to
act, “having control of usage [will] be critical,” he added.
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