Newtown Square, PA, U.S.A. --- (METERING.COM) --- May 1, 2008 – Seven major utility companies are collaborating with software applications provider SAP AG in a joint effort to solve integration of advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) with enterprise technology.

AMI is the technical foundation for the industry’s broader smart grid vision aimed at improving energy efficiency and grid reliability. SAP and the participating utility companies have formed the SAP AMI Lighthouse Council to address AMI from the back office to the meter, with the objective of integrating the SAP for Utilities solution to market-leading AMI systems.

The formation of the SAP AMI Lighthouse Council demonstrates a commitment to a new AMI approach that aims to achieve integration of end-to-end processes between the meter and the backend systems and to reduce a company’s total cost of ownership for AMI infrastructure. Efficient and scalable end-to-end integration is fundamental to both the success of utility AMI initiatives and to delivering shareholder value for the sizeable investment that AMI requires.

For the past nine months, the SAP AMI Lighthouse Council – comprised of CenterPoint Energy, CLP Power Hong Kong Limited, Consumers Energy, Energy East, Florida Power & Light, Oklahoma Gas & Electric and Public Service Electric & Gas – has been shaping the integration of SAP® solutions with AMI solutions for business processes, including customer relationship and billing and enterprise asset management. The SAP AMI Lighthouse Council also includes several strategic vendors – eMeter, Itron and OSIsoft. These vendors offer meter data unification and synchronization solutions that act as a powerful hub for meter and event data between AMI systems and the downstream SAP solutions.

“This has been and continues to be an impressive and somewhat unparalleled industry collaboration,” said Wayne Longcore, manager of enterprise architecture and standards, Consumers Energy. “Every stakeholder in this process, including the utilities, the partners and SAP, has invested the resources necessary to put AMI-enabled business processes at the fore, giving the business a seat at the AMI table.”