Elster, Tropos Networks sign reseller agreement

RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA SUNNYVALE, CALIFORNIA - Elster and Tropos Networks announced they have signed a reseller agreement that expands ElsterÂ’s portfolio of turnkey Smart Grid communications solutions.

Under the agreement, Elster will resell TroposÂ’ wireless regional area networking products, further extending the breadth of communications offerings of EnergyAxis, ElsterÂ’s comprehensive Smart Grid advanced metering infrastructure AMI solution.

Both companiesÂ’ products are field-proven and IP standards-based, simplifying integration and operations for customers. TroposÂ’ GridCom network architecture offers unprecedented resiliency, scalability, performance, security and control, providing a solid distribution area communications foundation for AMI and other Smart Grid applications.

Elster also will provide integration and support services for Tropos products.

“Elster’s EnergyAxis Smart Grid solution supports some of the most successful deployments in the world and, with innovators like Tropos, offers a broader range of leading solutions for utilities’ AMI projects,” said Mark Munday, president and CEO, Elster Solutions. “Elster and Tropos both offer best-in-class technologies that will help utilities build highly reliable, secure and robust Smart Grids,” Munday added.

“We are pleased to have been selected to work with a worldwide leader in AMI,” said Tom Ayers, president and chief executive officer, Tropos Networks. “The combination of Elster and Tropos provides utilities with industry leading solutions that are fundamental building blocks for Smart Grids.”

In a related announcement, Silicon Valley Power SVP has selected TroposÂ’ GridCom as the distribution area communications network for its smart grid program, SVP Meter Connect. SVP is the City of Santa ClaraÂ’s municipal electric utility, which serves over 50,000 customers.

The SVP Meter Connect program includes the TroposÂ’ private wireless communications network, automated metering infrastructure AMI systems, and integration services. The utility eventually plans to use the Tropos network to support additional smart grid applications, including distribution automation and mobile workers. In the future, the City plans to use the same network to provide mobile access for municipal field workers public safety, building and fire inspectors, parks and recreation, and more, reducing operational costs versus cellular cards, and delivering greater bandwidth.

A key goal of the SVP Meter Connect project is to further increase reliability of the utilityÂ’s distribution system itÂ’s estimated a power blackout can cost financial and IT-based Silicon Valley firms a million dollars per minute. SVP recently achieved the highest rating among power utilities in the nation for business customer satisfaction and value, scoring well above industry standards in reliability.

The project is expected to significantly reduce the time to detect and pinpoint outages in the distribution area, dramatically reducing response time for utility repair crews. Today, SVP relies on customers to report outages, and pinpointing the location of problems is a manual process. With the new smart grid systems in place, detecting and identifying the location of distribution area problems can take place centrally and within a few minutes of a fault occurring.

The first phase of SVP Meter Connect will begin in the first quarter of 2011 with rollout of the Tropos network and free public Wi-Fi access across the community. Beginning in the second quarter, SVP will install advanced meters for commercial and industry customers residential advanced meter rollout is slated to begin in 2012.

SVP will utilize Elster's EnergyAxis Smart Grid solution which will form a network of advanced meters. TroposÂ’ GridCom high performance mesh network will provide communications between ElsterÂ’s metering network and substations.

“Over the past five years, we have carefully developed our AMI plans and evaluated communications technologies that would provide efficiencies for both the utility and the City,” said Larry Owens, manager, customer services for Silicon Valley Power. “Other systems and technologies we considered are limited and don’t meet our needs moving forward. Tropos’ wireless network was the only one that could support our distribution automation requirements as well as offered the capacity to support other utility and municipal applications reliably and securely. The Tropos network gives us the ability to build broadband bridge to the future for our city.”

“We’re very pleased to have been chosen by Silicon Valley Power as they embark on the first phase of building their smart grid vision,” said Tom Ayers, president and CEO of Tropos Networks. “We look forward to being a part of the utility’s smart grid initiatives and in helping the city increase efficiencies and services for the community.”