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Energy company Mercury has selected a new platform for large customers after successfully completing its $441M merger with Trustpower.
German company Robotron will provide a new technology stack for Mercury’s largest customers with migration planned in the current 2025 financial year.
As reported in February, Mercury successfully migrated its mass market customers to a Gentrack’s billing system during the half-year to the end of December 2023.
“During the year, we embarked on a major technology transformation programme, including significant investment in new platforms to enable enhanced customer and employee experiences,” the company said in its annual report, released today.
Gentrack enables delivery of a range of telecommunications and energy bundles for customers.
Mercury is also gearing up to take advantage of AI, having formed what it described as “small multi-disciplinary teams” to explore the harnessing of AI and how to support the capability required to safely explore user case opportunities.
“The team continues to review opportunities to maximise business value from AI while emphasising ethics and eliminating bias,” the report said.
“Generative AI is being tested to analyse customer sentiment, topics, tone and agent engagement, helping to discover trends, opportunities, churn risks and innovative ideas for decision-making.”
Microsoft’s AI Copilot technologies were being trialed across various business groups to drive improvements in
everyday productivity.
Work to replace the company’s legacy SAP financial platform with Workday, in partnership with Accenture, was ongoing.
“The new cloud-based system and associated processes will help drive performance and growth across our business,” the report said.
Also being trialled is an autonomous vehicle, dubbed “Optimus Brine”, to enhance work safety at the company’s Rotokawa geothermal station near Taupō, as part of an enforceable undertaking agreement with WorkSafe.
The new vehicle will roam the Rotokawa station, taking pictures of valves, pumps and pipes and feeding the data to the station’s AI system.
The robot workmate has been fitted with infra-red sensors, cameras, gas sensors and sound sensors, to help minimise staff exposure to hazardous situations.
In time it would provide data to identify trends and help staff be more focused with plant maintenance.
The bad news is energy price increases are coming.
“We expect to implement a larger electricity price lift in FY25, than in the past few years, as a result of
increasing costs and rising level of investment required in critical electricity infrastructure,” the report warned.
Consumers are also facing larger gas price lifts, with supply constraints driving significant wholesale gas price increases.
“There has been significant investment in renewable energy as we shift to a low-carbon electrified future,” CEO Vince Hawksworth said.
Achieving this transition required a continued focus on security and affordability, he said.
“We have also seen gas come into the spotlight, with production challenges constraining supply. This poses a challenge in both the electricity and gas markets over the next couple of years.”
Mercury reported revenue up 25.4% to $3.4B and net profit of $290M, up $159%.