Scottish and Southern Energy plc (“SSE”) and Sigma Capital Group plc (“Sigma”) have agreed to invest £2m in Onzo, a company that enables energy customers to reduce their energy consumption.
London, 31st March 2008
Based in London, Onzo is a new company whose purpose is to empower people to live lighter and smarter in terms of their energy consumption. Onzo specialises in energy visualization technologies across all customer touchpoints and offers energy monitoring equipment and related services through bills and the internet. Onzo partners with energy suppliers to create stronger two-way relationships between suppliers and energy users and increase customer attraction and retention, minimise cost to serve, and increase revenue per customer.
Onzo will be launching its innovative energy display products later this year. With increasing awareness on the part of consumers of both the economic cost and the CO2 impact of energy consumption, Onzo are expecting widespread consumer interest. Onzo believes that its energy display products can help save consumers around a quarter of their home energy consumption.
Sigma, investing from the Sigma Sustainable Energy Fund II, and SSE have each invested £1 million . Sigma and SSE will also both provide non-executive directors who will join Onzo’s board. In addition, SSE has placed initial orders worth over £7 million with Onzo for the company’s energy display products and specialist data services. As part of this major order, SSE has secured exclusive rights to Onzo’s products and services covering the UK and Ireland.
Joel Hagan, Chief Executive of Onzo, said,
“Onzo is delighted to be working with SSE to make our products and services available to consumers in the UK and Ireland. In SSE, we found a partner who was excited about the full range of what we can offer. Sigma Capital Group helped bring the deal together and their support has been critical throughout the process. This deal is recognition that Onzo leads the way in this arena.”
David Gardner, Head of Ventures at SSE, said,
“Energy customers have a growing expectation that their supplier will provide new ways to help them reduce their energy consumption, and in the future this could become an important service differentiator. This partnership with Onzo will give SSE access to leading-edge technologies that will help us provide a new level of support to customers who want to reduce their energy consumption.
“Until now the SSE ventures team have focused on investments relating to alternative energy sources. This deal, which is a great example of our partnership with Sigma, demonstrates that SSE is prepared to invest in any strong proposition that directly supports our strategic aim of ensuring that SSE plays a major part in the long-term transformation of the production and consumption of energy.”
Mark Hogarth, Investment Director of Sigma, said,
“This is a very exciting investment for us and we are delighted to be co-investors in Onzo with Scottish and Southern Energy plc. We think Onzo has developed an innovative and commercially focused concept which has huge potential and stands out from other companies in this space.
Consumers are now much more sensitive to ‘green’ issues and, at the same time, people are keen to reduce their energy bills. This means that Onzo’s products have a double appeal. Onzo has a great team with great ideas and we look forward to working with them, alongside SSE, on the next phase of the company’s development.”
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