As we've noted a number of times, the energy-management business is getting awful crowded. There's a bevy of services tackling the residential market (Tendril, EnergyHub, Control4, etc.) and a handful of startups targeting commercial customers (Hara, Enviance, Carbonetworks, and more). Amid this tussle, it's not hard for individual companies to get lost.
This seemed to be the case with GridPoint, a well-funded but undistinguished Smart Grid company that found success helping utilities revamp their operations. Its platform allows energy vendors to keep tabs on electricity supply and demand in their coverage areas, and provides technical guidance for integrating renewable sources of energy, plug-in cars, and new storage solutions.
Last year, it bought consumer-facing energy management company Lixar SRS, but it's found little traction in this market since.
That might start changing today, however, with the announcement that GridPoint will be rolling out its energy management tools to a many as 2,250 post offices across the country -- a contract worth $28.7 million. The U.S. Posta; Service has been consistently dinged on how much energy it uses every year, and has made it an organizational goal to reduce the amount of energy used by its offices by 30 percent by 2015. Apparently GridPoint is its choice to make this happen.
But the Postal Service is providing some key benefits to GridPoint as well. As Earth2Tech points out, it could be the perfect laboratory for testing out new energy management applications. For example, it is already making moves to integrate plug-in hybrid vehicles into its fleets of mail trucks. One of the major uses for energy management systems going forward will be to keep close tabs on how much energy plug-in vehicles are drawing from the grid, how much it is costing, and the best times during the day to charge up. Partnering with the USPS could give GridPoint a leg up in this area.
Beefing up its focus on facility energy management puts the company in the same ranks as demand response firm EnerNOC, and solar financing startup SolarCity -- both of which are departing from their core business models to delve into consumer-facing energy management offerings (EnerNoc acquired SmallFoot and SolarCity just bought up Building Solutions to head in this direction).
While GridPoint may have been down in recent months, weathering layoffs and executive suite shakeups, it was never really out. The Arlington, Va.-based company has raised a staggering $230 million from a flock of backers. Now, with the USPS deal increasing its number of energy management locations by more than 30 percent, it finally might be able to build brand recognition that matches its coffers.