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Sponsored report UTILITY WEEK | 7TH - 13TH APRIL 2017 | 25 Column Harnessing technology Wipro's Arun Krishnamurthi says innovation is a key differentiator in the changing utilities ecosystem. U tilities ecosystems are transforming very quickly. We need to make sure that efforts to innovate and adapt create win-win situations for all players in our energy and water industries – especially end users. This ambition will always rely on understanding customers first, and designing services, processes and operations based on that understanding. Technology is a tool for delivering those designs and, as technology advances, it can enable improvements to cus- tomer experience and customer value which could not have been imagined a decade ago. At Wipro, we are dedicated to harnessing technology for the ben- efit of our customers and their end goals. We have an approach to innovation in the digital world which uses a defined "digital can- vas" to map innovation directly to business outcomes and strategy horizons. We also have R&D teams working to find novel and effective applications for emerging technology areas – in disciplines includ- ing robotics and automation, cognitive computing, predictive analyt- ics and artificial intelligence, to name a few. For example, we have recently invested in harnessing the growing power of artificial intelligence via our cognitive energy intelligence platform for distributed energy systems. This offers market partici- pants from retailers, through distributors and technology providers, services that optimise, analyse, support decision-making and, ulti- mately, enable customer-led innovation. Through new data discovery techniques – like visual sciences and story-telling with data – we have learned how to accelerate time- to-market for new innovations, making sure companies and cus- tomers can realise the benefits of new business models and smart ideas in a timely way. We believe our approach to inno- vation is what differentiates us from other digital transformation firms and we are excited to be a part of the utilities ecosystem at this time. Through our work with Utility Week on the Technology and Inno- vation Council, we look for- ward to building a stronger and stronger understand- ing of how technology- enabled innovation can help realise new benefits for custom- ers – especially those most in need of service improvements. Brought to you in association with behaviour. But in a utilities market domi- nated by so many big beasts, this has its own set of challenges. "The complexity of that world can make it difficult for smaller players to bring their offer to the market," agrees Eric Brown, head of innovation at the Energy Systems Catapult. "There is quite a lot of policy uncertainty, therefore innovators and their investors might not have the ability to price the risk of investing, and that creates another type of issue." Brown cites the government's 2015 U-turn on feed-in tariffs for solar PV as an example: "It was there and then it wasn't there and that type of thing creates a reluc- tance to invest." There are also "commercial barriers", he says, and these oen involve procure- ment. "Smaller companies find it difficult to sell to big operators because they have cer- tain requirements of their suppliers, such as level of insurance or their balance sheet [strength]." The Energy Systems Catapult tries to help start-ups and small businesses understand and overcome some of the difficulties they are encountering in the market in any way that can make a difference. Ofgem's Innova- tion Link, launched last December fulfills a similar function. "There are some technical barriers," explains Brown. "Some innovators have really good ideas but don't understand how it fits into the bigger picture, as opposed to how their particular piece works. If we look at the smaller players, particularly, it's quite difficult." Furthermore, when it comes to getting genuinely innovative technology to the cus- tomers that need it most, another barrier appears: cost. Energy Systems Catapult is carrying out work to better understand the nature and extent of fuel poverty and how innovators can reach the most vulnerable customers. For Brown, the difficulty here encapsulates the problem: "Some of the technology – whether it's smart metering or whatever – which would genuinely help the fuel poor – tends not to be accessible because of the cost. The irony is that they can't get access to the benefit you want to deliver." That's why, for him and others, innova- tion isn't just about the latest app or piece of kit, it's about how it can be integrated into a bigger, more complex market to make a real difference. "Integration is a hard topic," concludes Brown. "It's much easier to go away and invent a product than think about how it is integrated into the whole picture."