Fierce Innovation Awards: Energy Edition Program Announces Winners; Innovari Receives Top Recognition

PORTLAND, Ore., Nov. 5, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Innovari has been recognized by this year's Fierce Innovation Awards:  Energy Edition, a unique industry awards program powered by the publishers of FierceEnergy and Smart Grid News. Innovari, developer of the Interactive Energy Platform, received top honors in the category "Distribution Management Systems," as well as an overall "Best in Show" award.

Winners were selected by an exclusive panel of judges, including:  Dr. Steven Pratt, Chief Technology Officer, CenterPoint Energy; Jason Handley, Director of Smart Grid Emerging Technology and Operations, Duke Energy; Joe Solari, Director of IT Smart Grid Technologies, Ameren Corporation; Joseph Svachula, Vice President of Smart Grid and Technology, Commonwealth Edison; Laney Brown, Director of Smart Grid Initiatives, Iberdrola USA; Lisa Davidson, Director of Customer Programs, San Diego Gas & Electric; and Elizabeth Murphy, Vice President, External Affairs, PECO.

Judges evaluated submissions based on technology innovation, financial impact, market validation, ability to integrate into existing network environments, and end-user customer experience.

Fierce recognized Innovari for its industry-leading and innovative Interactive Energy Platform (IEP) that enables utilities to unlock affordable capacity from edge-of-grid resources to improve grid utilization and reliability, defer or eliminate costly infrastructure upgrades, and increase satisfaction throughout their customer base. 

"We are honored for this recognition and incredibly thankful to the amazing utility partners who have helped us prove what is possible," said Chris Hickman, CEO and President, Innovari. "We've worked tirelessly to develop a demand-side capacity solution that fits seamlessly into the utility business model. Our IEP strengthens utility financial performance, improves customer and utility relationships, and provides utilities with a generation-quality asset they can leverage year-round to deliver cleaner, more affordable, and more reliable power to the community."

With Innovari's solution, utilities can dispatch capacity surgically at a single site, distribution feeder, or substation to deal with specific grid constraints.  They can also dispatch the entire system – like a virtual distributed power plant – with the same confidence, two-way verification, and closed-loop control of a peaker plant. The IEP informs utilities in real time how much capacity they're "generating" and accurately delivers and reports capacity based on weather, historic performance, and live feedback.

When commercial and industrial buildings are connected to the IEP, utilities can temporarily reduce building load, to exact customer specifications, without any impact to customer operations or comfort. The IEP automates all actions and continuously monitors building environment and load.

"'Best-in-Show' recognition from top utility executives is proof positive we're moving the industry to a more utility-centric, demand-side solution that benefits utilities, regulators, and the customers they serve with the first win-win-win business model the industry has seen," Hickman said. 

About Innovari:
Innovari's Interactive Energy Platform connects utilities, their customers, and their communities to improve how the world uses energy. Our solution attacks the electric grid's core problem—the load duration curve—unlocking access to affordable capacity that improves system utilization, reliability, and financial performance, while our non-profit, Plugged into Kids, brings together utilities and their customers to help the children in their communities. With deep grid situational awareness, we enable dynamic, two-way verifiable demand side management; grid system optimization; renewable and distributed energy resources integration; and more. Innovari is the utility industry's Capacity for Change: www.innovari.com. Innovari is a VantagePoint Capital Partners energy-innovation portfolio company: www.vpcp.com.

About FierceMarkets:
FierceMarkets, a wholly owned subsidiary of Questex Media Group, is a leader in B2B e-media, providing information and marketing services in the telecommunications, life sciences, healthcare, IT, energy, government, finance, and retail industries through its portfolio of email newsletters, websites, webinars and live events. Every business day, FierceMarkets' wide array of publications reaches more than 1.3 million executives in more than 100 countries.

SOURCE Innovari

Related Links

http://www.innovari.com