[20170921] Media Release - SP Group Hosts Finale Of First Global Energy Acceleratorhttps://www.spgroup.com.sg/dam/spgroup/wcm/connect/spgrp/11b868a8-c08e-4a47-bc7c-88bb6f4bdad2/%5B20170921%5D+Media+Release+-+SP+Group+Hosts+Finale+Of+First+Global+Energy+Accelerator.pdf?MOD=AJPERES&CVID=News Release SP GROUP HOSTS FINALE OF FIRST GLOBAL ENERGY ACCELERATOR AS LEADING UTILITIES AND ENERGY START-UPS MEET IN SINGAPORE • Free Electrons global energy accelerator brings together international utilities and promising energy start-ups to create solutions in grid reliability and efficiency, renewable energy sources and home energy management, among others • Winning start-up will receive USD$175,000 cash prize at grand finale on 21 September • SP Group inks MOUs with two start-ups on solar application for homes, and low voltage electricity grid monitoring Singapore, 21 September 2017 – SP Group [SP] is hosting the grand finale of Free Electrons – the first global energy accelerator – when the world’s leading utilities and energy-start-ups gather in Singapore this week. Following a five-month international circuit, the winning start-up will be crowned at the closing event on 21 September at Gardens by the Bay, Flower Field Hall, taking home a cash prize of USD$175,000. Free Electrons global energy accelerator is founded by eight international utilities – SP, AusNet Services (Australia), Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA), ESB (Electricity Supply Board, Ireland), EDP (Energias de Portugal), innogy [Germany], Origin Energy [Australia], and Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) – to collaborate with promising energy start-ups on innovative solutions for the future energy needs of customers. The guest of honour for the Grand Finale event is Ms Low Yen Ling, Senior Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Trade and Industry and Ministry of Education. Also in attendance are senior representatives from the eight international utilities and industry partners. Mr Wong Kim Yin, Group Chief Executive Officer of SP Group, said, “SP Group is committed to drive research and innovation that benefit consumers, helping them to save energy and cost. Through Free Electrons, we can harness the best ideas co-created by promising start-ups in collaboration with the world's leading utilities, to deliver innovative solutions that will meet future energy needs at a national and global scale.” MOU with start-ups SP Group will ink memoranda of understanding (MOU) with two of the start-ups to test the technical viability and compatibility of solar technologies for Singapore's climate, and grid monitoring solutions. The first agreement was signed with Portuguese start-up BeOn Energy, who provides residential solar plug and play solutions. This could result in the wider adoption of cost effective solar solutions to homes. The second agreement was signed with Swiss start-up DEPsys, for a low voltage grid monitoring solution. The adoption of this solution could further strengthen SP Group’s world-class grid efficiency and reliability. Industry Dialogue A highlight of the finale are two industry-wide panel discussions on 21 September. The first is a discussion on “New Energy Frontiers, and disruptions facing the industry”, featuring leaders from AusNet Services, innogy, EDP and TEPCO. The second panel is a discussion on “Scaling Innovation Globally through innovation and investments”, with speakers from Temasek, ETF Partners, Idinvest Partners and Monk’s Hill Ventures. About the Free Electrons Global Accelerator Out of 450 applications from around the world, 12 promising start-ups were selected to participate in the global programme. They are advancing solutions in areas such as grid operations, renewable energy connections, electric vehicles and home energy management. The 12 finalists, who focus on later stage solutions development, refined and tested their ideas on the global stage as they gleaned insights from the experience, platforms and customer base of the eight utilities which represent a global footprint of 73 million end customers, across 40 countries. Upon deployment, the solutions will benefit customers from enhanced grid reliability and efficiency, incorporation of renewable energy sources and better service experience. More information on the 12 start-ups can be found in Annex B. Soaking in Singapore’s innovation and energy landscape In the Singapore leg this week, the utilities and start-ups will take part in a specially organised programme to immerse themselves into Singapore's and ASEAN’s innovation and energy landscape. This will enable the start-ups to learn about the unique customer demographic, industry demands, opportunities and environmental considerations in Singapore and across the region. They will continue working with the utilities to shape their respective solutions for the closing event on 21 September. The winner will be determined by how innovative the product or service is, the potential of the solution to be scaled globally, and how the team has grown through Free Electrons in collaboration with the utilities. The eight utilities and 12 start-ups will continue their working relationships, the prospect of partnership agreements to further trial and implement the solutions. The Singapore finale is the third and final module of the five-month long inaugural Free Electrons Global Accelerator programme, which has seen the utilities and start-ups participate in learning and development modules in Silicon Valley, as well as Lisbon and Dublin. - Ends - ANNEX A: Participating Utilities SP Group SP Group is a leading energy utilities group in the Asia Pacific. It owns and operates electricity and gas transmission and distribution businesses in Singapore and Australia, and district cooling businesses in Singapore and China. SP Group is committed to providing customers with reliable and efficient energy utilities services. More than 1.4 million industrial, commercial and residential customers in Singapore benefit from SP Group’s world-class transmission, distribution and market support services. These networks are amongst the most reliable and cost-effective world-wide. For more information, please visit spgroup.com.sg or for follow us on Facebook at fb.com/SPGroupSG. AusNet Services AusNet Services is a major player in the Australian energy industry. We are Victoria's largest energy delivery service business owning and operating approximately $11 billion of electricity and gas distribution assets that connect into more than 1.3 million Victorian homes and businesses. The energy landscape is transforming and so are we. We are looking for new ways to move energy with significant investment in creating energy solutions to meet tomorrow's needs. More information at www.ausnetservices.com.au. Dubai Electricity and Water (DEWA) DEWA is committed to promoting Dubai’s vision through the delivery of sustainable electricity and water services at a world-class level of reliability, efficiency and safety in an environment that nurtures innovation with a competent workforce and effective partnerships; supporting the sustainability of resources. More information at www.dewa.gov.ae. ESB (Electricity Supply Board) ESB is Ireland’s leading energy company, operating across the full spectrum of the electricity market: from generation, through transmission and distribution to supply. In addition, ESB extracts further value at certain points along this chain: supplying gas, using our networks to carry fibre for telecommunications, developing electric vehicle public charging infrastructure and an international consultancy arm which has worked in 120 countries globally. More information at www.esb.ie/innovation. EDP (Energias de Portugal) EDP is an energy producer, distributor and retailer with around 12 million customers in Portugal, Spain and Brazil. EDP has around 25GW of power production capacity of which 10GW are wind power generation, making us the 4th largest wind power producer in the world and 3rd in the US, and 5GW are hydro. Our renewable power business is present in 14 countries including US, Brazil and several European countries. More company information at www.edp.pt and startup support program information at www.edpstarter.com Innogy innogy SE is a European energy company, offering sustainable and innovative energy solutions. With its three business areas of renewables, grid & infrastructure as well as retail, it addresses the requirements of a modern, decarbonised, decentralised and digital energy world. More information at www.innogy.com. Origin Energy Origin is an Australian integrated energy solutions provider with leading positions across energy retailing, power generation and natural gas production. Origin has a rapidly growing renewable energy portfolio, and was the world's first energy company to adopt all seven 'We Mean Business Coalition' initiatives, joining a worldwide group of non-government organisations, signatory companies and institutional investors committed to leadership on climate change. Origin is also scaling up its capabilities in digital metering and data and analytics to create more innovative and differentiated energy solutions for its millions of customers. More information at www.originenergy.com.au. Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (TEPCO) Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. (TSE: 9501), headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is the largest utility in Japan serving more than 29 million homes and businesses. Worldwide the company has more than 74 subsidiaries and affiliates in 8 countries and employs approximately 43,330 people. Consolidated revenue for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2016, totaled 6.8 trillion Japanese yen. The company was established in 1951 and is listed on the First Section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange. For more information, visit http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/corpinfo. ANNEX B: Free Electrons Start-ups Aperio Systems Aperio provides resilience against all malicious actors aiming to cause critical physical damage in industrial and infrastructure settings such as power grids. Aperio’s software detects and defends against any type of sensor-related data forgery, as well as provide data quality insights into sensor malfunctions. Once Aperio detects a forgery, they will be able to recover the ground truth and restore state awareness to the operators. Find out more at http://aperio-systems.com BeOn Energy Develops microinverters and DIY Solar Kits specifically designed to plug solar systems to wall sockets, producing economic energy for self-consumption. Find out more at www.beonenergy.com Climote A home energy management system that gives users the ability to easily change the temperature of their homes and hot water through a smart app. By harnessing this consumer demand for energy, the climote Energy Optimization Technology (EOT) and software will cleverly link it to intermittent renewable supply enabling the flow of low cost energy to consumers. Find out more at www.climote.ie DataGlen DataGlen has developed DERitos, an open and modular operating system, for managing Distributed Energy Resources (DER) such as solar plants, solar+storage, etc. While their platform enables a wide variety of DER applications (such as distributed generation, battery management), it does so while ensuring the safety of electric grids, consumer equipment and consumer comfort. Find out more at www.dataglen.com DEPsys A Swiss technology startup that provides solutions enabling traditional low-voltage electricity networks to cope with the new constraints of decentralised production from renewable energy sources, such as photovoltaic systems and wind turbines, as well as emerging storage technologies. Find out more at www.depsys.ch Driivz Driivz is an innovative end to end EV (Electrical Vehicles) charging software platform, that serve as the operating systems for the world’s major EV charging network providers. The platform provides best in class operations management, grid management, user management, automatic intelligent troubleshooting, as well as advanced billing capabilities. Driivz enables EV charging service providers to efficiently and easily operate, manage and develop their business in a world of disruption and change. Find out more at www.driivz.com EthosGen EthosGen's energy system provides sustainable, resilient and scalable generation of electricity and cooling by converting waste heat from industry, manufacturing processes, geothermal and biomass from as low as 100⁰C to 700⁰C. Find out more at www.ethosgen.com Greencom Networks A Software-as-a-Service Company, offering end-to-end energy IoT solutions for the utility industry and energy service companies (ESCOs). Their software enables management of energy demand, supply and storage capacity within Virtual Power Plants for the evolving energy markets. Find out more at www.greencom-networks.com HST Solar A solar software startup that reduces the overall cost of solar energy production by using an integrated approach that allows for computational processes to design solar systems without manual labour. Find out more at www.hstsolar.com OhmConnect A software startup that monitors real time conditions on electricity grids and notifies users when ‘dirty’ or unclean energy is being used. This system incentivises end users to limit energy consumption during these given times in order to limit use of unclean energy and in return allows for consumers to receive monetary compensation at the end of the year. Find out more at www.ohmconnect.com Simple Energy Simple Energy is the #1 provider of utility-branded ecommerce marketplaces. Simple Energy works with utilities to increase customer satisfaction, achieve energy efficiency and demand response targets, and establish new business models for the utility of the future. Find out more at www.simpleenergy.com Tempus Energy A machine learning software that forecasts the closing electricity market price before market closure. The software processes data in real time and combines market forecasting with the ability to predict electricity usage and understand how flexible assets perform in different conditions to minimise electricity cost and maximise use of renewable generation. Find out more at www.tempusenergy.com