First Utility Partners With Opower to Help UK Households cut Their Energy Bills

LEAMINGTON SPA, England, July 19, 2011 -

• First Utility enhances smart meter offering with
  Opower‘s home energy management platform

• Opower and First Utility to conduct first of a kind consumer
  energy saving programme in 2012 to inform Cabinet Office and DECC
  policy-making

• Programme offers potential annual savings of £400 million on
  energy bills if deployed across all UK households

First Utility, the
UK’s largest independent domestic energy company and href="www.opower.com/">Opower, the leading US efficiency
and smart grid software company, announced on Wednesday July
6^th a new partnership to provide Opower’s home energy
management programme to First Utility customers. The programme,
which is highlighted in the ‘nudge report’ on energy efficiency
from the Cabinet Office’s Behavioural Insights team and the
Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), will be the first
of its kind in the UK and is poised to help First Utility customers
find ways to save on their bills. Deployed to all UK households,
the programme has the potential to save consumers as much as £400
million on energy bills each year.

First Utility, the only UK energy company to offer href="www.first-utility.com/home-energy/smart-meters">smart
meters to all of its customers, will use Opower’s software
platform to translate its customer’s smart meter data into a range
of new energy-saving tools, including reports that offer
comparative consumption information and household-specific analysis
of consumption patterns, access to an online portal with detailed
usage information, and high bill alerts designed to help customers
avoid excessive bills while they still have time to change their
usage. Customers will be engaged via mailed reports, web portal,
email and SMS messages, as well as social media. This multi-channel
engagement approach is designed to reach all demographic segments,
including the most vulnerable, and drive a high level of customer
engagement and energy savings.

As the first large-scale, information-based energy efficiency
programme in the UK, Opower and First Utility intend to work in
consultation with the Behavioural Insights Team in the Cabinet
Office and DECC to assess the impact of this program to inform
future smart meter policy. Energy savings from the programme will
be measured and verified independently by leading academics in the
UK using data from smart meters.

“We know that household budgets are under increasing pressure,
and that energy bills are part of that,” said Mark Daeche, Founder
of First Utility. “At First Utility, we are able to provide
cutting-edge home energy management tools enabled by our recently
deployed Smart Meters. We have partnered with Opower, a leading
energy management software provider in the United States, to help
us deliver the best utility customer experience in the UK, and help
our customers save on their bills.”

“We are thrilled to be working with a customer-focused utility
like First Utility,” said Opower President and Co-founder Alex
Laskey. “Our experience in the US has taught us that utilities that
put the customers first and proactively help them manage their
energy use have more engaged and satisfied customers, which is
ultimately good for business. We expect that our partnership with
First Utility will yield significant savings on bills for
households, and plan to share these results with DECC and the
Cabinet Office as they consider policies to realise the most
customer benefits from smart meters.”

A smart meter is a technologically advanced energy meter,
designed to replace the old-fashioned gas and electricity meter
that is intended to provide an energy company with an accurate
energy usage reading. A smart meter records a household’s
electricity consumption half-hourly, and gas daily, and
communicates that information back to the utility, allowing a
richer set of energy management tools, like usage alerts, to be
offered to customers.

About First Utility:

First Utility is the smarter independent utilities supplier,
offering electricity and gas services to a range of consumer and
business customers. It is the only energy provider to roll out
smart meters to all its customers, throughout the UK. It is through
the use of smart metering technology that First Utility can empower
consumers to manage and reduce their own energy consumption and
bills. First Utility is headquartered in Warwick.
www.first-utility.com

About Opower:

Founded in 2007, Opower is America’s leading energy efficiency
software provider and one of the Wall Street Journal’s Top 10
Cleantech Companies of 2011. The company partners with utilities to
motivate and engage customers, promoting better understanding of
energy usage and leading to lower bills. Opower’s home energy
management platform offers consumers a detailed picture of their
personal energy use, and provides tailored feedback through
multiple communications channels. Currently working with more than
55 utilities across 24 states in the U.S., Opower currently reaches
10 million households. To date, the company has saved more than 390
Gwh of electricity or the equivalent of powering almost 50,000
households for a year.

Further information and interviews

Please contact CubanEight (First Utility):

•    Sian Gaskell, +44(0)1869 238089, +44(0)7879 997
885, siangaskell@cubaneight.com

•    Siobhan Eyres, +44(0)1869 238089, +44(0)7912 283
862, siobhaneyres@cubaneight.com

•    Rachel Brewin, +44(0)1869 238089, +44(0)7879 997
886, rachelbrewin@cubaneight.com

Or Daniel J Edelman (Opower)

•    Ben Burton, +44(0)7801-077638,
Ben.burton@edelman.com

•    Jessica Lennard, +44(0)7786-025652,
Jessica.lennard@edelman.com

•    Nicola Flynn, +44(0)20-3047-2365,
Nicola.flynn@edelman.com

•    Emily Dimmock, +44(0)20-3047-2076,
Emily.dimmock@edelman.com

.