Serious Materials Enters Energy Management Market

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Serious Materials, a manufacturer of energy-efficient windows and eco-friendly drywall, has entered the energy management software market with the launch of SeriousEnergy Manager. The Web-based platform allows building owners and property managers to monitor, analyze, and optimize energy use in commercial buildings. The company says the product delivers immediate energy savings of 10 to 15 percent with payback in one to two years.

The new service offering also formalizes the company's new business unit called SeriousEnergy. "We work with our customers everyday to help them retrofit or build toward very aggressive energy efficiency goals. We see immediate opportunities for energy savings, but you can't improve what you can't measure. SeriousEnergy Manager solves that issue and then helps maintain it for optimal performance," said Mark Mitchell, Serious Materials' SVP of Mergers & Acquisitions, and general manager of SeriousEnergy, in s statement.

With the new offering, Serious Materials also is competing with a growing number of companies offering commercial building energy management, reports CNET.

These include products from the big players like Cisco and Oracle, which continue to expand their energy management offerings.

Serious told CNET that its software is different from other solutions because it focuses on energy monitoring and optimization.

Since SeriousManager is a Web-based platform, there is no software to install or maintain. The platform's SeriousInsight advanced analytics integrates occupancy analysis, historical and external data to deliver real-time insight into energy use, enabling building managers to establish energy use baselines and trends, says the company.

SeriousEnergy Manager leverages core technology from Valence Energy, an earlier acquisition of Serious Materials.

Customers like Echelon are touting the application's ease of use and capability to garner greater energy savings. "Using the SeriousEnergy Manager's advanced analytics at our headquarters enables us to go beyond basic energy monitoring to achieve greater energy savings," said Anders Axelsson, senior vice president at Echelon, a smart grid company, in a statement.

"It positions SeriousEnergy Manager as a leader in energy management. The fact that it can be very quickly implemented using Echelon's SmartSever to get energy information makes it an ideal solution for energy management and commissioning in commercial buildings," Axelsson added.

Serious Materials joined the Save Energy Now Leader Program last year, voluntarily committing to reduce its energy efficiency 25 percent over the coming decade.

In the PC power management software sector, Alternative Vision Of Business (AVOB) announced that it is formally entering the U.S. market with the opening of its U.S. headquarters in San Francisco.

AVOB also marks its U.S. debut with the availability of a free energy assessment tool for enterprise PCs. The tool makes it easy for SMBs and large enterprises to get an accurate estimate of their current energy consumption and carbon footprint, says AVOB. The tool is available for download at www.avob-usa.com/download.

"The average PC is idle more than 75 percent of the week, and when running, most users need less than 10 percent of the compute capabilities of their machine," said Pierre Duchesne, Co-Founder and CEO of AVOB, in a statement. "AVOB goes beyond traditional energy saving solutions by having the unique ability to throttle power consumption during usage time as well."

AVOB says it is the first in its market to have a pricing model directly based on actual savings realized by customers. Software fees are calculated based on the customer's expected savings as a result of a thorough assessment. Payback is typically in less than six months, according to the company.

The company also launched its fourth generation AVOB Energy Saver for SMBs and large enterprises. AVOB Energy Saver can reduce a company's energy bill by up to 50 percent, and has helped enterprise customers save more than a million dollars in energy costs, according to the company.

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