The leaders of GE Digital plan to acquire an Ontario-based software company that helps utilities better plan and manage their renewable and distributed energy assets.
Terms of GE Digital’s deal for Opus One Solutions Energy Corp., which was founded in 2011, aren’t being disclosed. The companies have worked together on past projects and officials said Tuesday their plan to join forces will enable them to ramp up their work on DER scheduling, dispatch, switching and operations planning via Opus One’s GridOS software platform and GE Digital’s services portfolio. The acquisition is expected to close in the next month.
“We’ve heard clearly from our utility partners that they need an integrated end-to-end platform to plan, operate, and transact with DERs on their grids.” said Joshua Wong, Opus One’s president and CEO and a former head of smart grid work at Toronto Hydro Electric System. “We look forward to becoming an integral part of GE Digital, combining our complementary strengths in best-in-class software solutions. It’s an exciting time in our mission to enable the energy transition and the grid of the future.”
Opus One’s client portfolio includes well-known names such as Southern California Edison, ComEd and Ameren and the company has an office in New York City in addition to its home base in the Toronto area. Earlier this year, the Canadian government awarded Wong and his team $2 million to develop and demonstrate a shared economy model for electric vehicle chargers.
“Electric utilities around the world face new obstacles with the rapid growth of renewables and DERs,” said Jim Walsh, general manager of GE Digital’s grid software business. “With increased demand for renewable energy and electric vehicles in every region, challenges for grid and market operators are more acute every day.”
GE Digital has 21,000 customers around the world and markets a range of analytics and grid modernization services to customers in various industries. Its work with utilities covers eight of the 10 largest utilities in the Fortune 500 and more than 230 transmission companies. The business is in line to be combined with GE’s renewable energy and GE Power businesses and spun out from the GE mothership in early 2024 as part of a plan announced last month. Compared to renewables and power, GE Digital is small: Whereas renewable energy rang up $11.5 billion in revenues and power had $12.2 billion in sales through the first three quarters of this year, GE Digital is included in GE’s corporate and eliminations segment, which had $693 million in revenue through Sept. 30.
