247. AI powered EMS behind the meter - Sep26

SPEAKER_1 (0:04)

With Laurent Segalen from London and Gerard Reid from Berlin, this is Redefining Energy.

Laurent Segalen (0:10)

Today on Refining Energy, Gerard, we're going to go geeky. We're going to talk about Energy Management System powered by AI.

Gerard Reid (0:18)

E-M-S.

Yeah, absolutely. I'm looking forward to this, Laurent. I'm hearing this phrase for years, and I think I have a reasonable idea what it is, but we want to get someone on who really is an expert in this area, and also just explain why these Energy Management Systems are so important.

Laurent Segalen (0:37)

But first of all, from a partner.

SPEAKER_4 (0:38)

Sure, you can search every corner of the Earth for the best energy industry data. Digging deeper. Going to extremes.

But with Wood Mackenzie, it doesn't have to be a challenge. With the largest interconnected data set for energy and natural resources at your fingertips, supercharged by Synoptic AI, you can be sure. Wood Mack sure. Wood Mackenzie. Intelligence Connected.

Laurent Segalen (1:08)

Back to the show. Yes, Gerard. And part of our series of inviting a startup, we're going to Belgium, where a young company is absolutely killing it and it's called Companion, Companion AI. And two very savvy friends out of university, they decided to launch a digital native EMS layer. And I thought they would be eaten alive by the Schneider and the Siemens, but not at all.

They are beating them at their own game. So Thomas Vyncke, our guest, is going to explain all this.

Gerard Reid (1:41)

So let's bring him on the show. Thomas, welcome to the show.

Thomas Vyncke (1:44)

Thanks for having me.

Laurent Segalen (1:45)

Thomas, you have created the software company around EMS, Energy Management System. What's an Energy Management System?

Thomas Vyncke (1:54)

I often say an EMS stands for everything management system, because everyone uses the term for whatever basically that does something in the energy space.

We feel that EMS encompasses basically to hook up different energy assets that companies have the harmonized way to the internet. They can send meter data, they can receive set points, and we calculate these set points. We often call it actually a financial optimization layer that sits on top of an EMS. So you have an EMS with legacy players that started from the hardware world, and we basically integrate with them to get the monitoring data out of these systems, and also to be able to share a direction on how they should behave locally, to reduce energy costs, to reduce risks, to create new revenue streams from balancing markets.

Gerard Reid (2:50)

Thomas, maybe talk a little bit about what the market is and who the big players are in it as well, just to give a bit more context.

Thomas Vyncke (2:57)

We often present the market as a layered system where you have companies selling equipment to large OEMs. You have, yeah, of course, the one selling solar panels. You have the one selling batteries. You have the one selling EV chargers. You have the one selling E-Borriers. Those are really the sort of manufacturers of that equipment.

Layer on top is what I call the local EMS layer. Those are gateways, Scada systems. There you have the Schneiders, the ABBs, the Hitachis, the Siemens of this world, which are large incumbents, but you also have a couple of newer players that are more sort of battery and solar native, the new electrified technology. Those are still actually hardware players, a bit on the border between the operational technology and the informational technology. Then the layer that we play in this financial optimization, that's pure software, that's near trading actually, making the decisions of what to do when to deliver financial arbitrage. And then on top of that, there's a layer of what we call market access. So there's players holding all the regulatory and administrative responsibilities of making sure that on behalf of these customers, we can participate in the markets or we can do actions that have a clear financial implication.

And those four layers, I see the industry really orienting itself around these four layers, definitely in the behind the meter context, because it means that everyone can focus a bit on what they are good at rather than creating this fully vertical stack where you would need to produce hardware, integrate it, do software, do trading. I don't really believe in that when it comes to complicated behind the meter contexts.

Laurent Segalen (4:43)

You just do the electrons or do you do the gas as well and those types of things?

Thomas Vyncke (4:47)

We focus on the electrons because why we launch the company is to make the energy transition work. But sometimes you need to go into gas as well. If you want to do fuel arbitrage, if you have an electric boiler and you have a gas boiler, we want to help you make the electric boiler a successful investment. But that means we need to look into what's your gas price as well to make the decision of when to run electrically.