In Phase I, an Electric Distribution Utility Roadmap report was released in January 2004, to provide a view of the evolution of the electric distribution utility environment over the next 20 years. This particular report covers the first work stream—Planning for Now & 2010.

63% of companies state that they use Location-Based Services such as GPS, GIS, AVL and RFID in their field service operations. These companies state that the major purpose of adopting LBS is to improve their field scheduling and routing while allowing for improved asset/employee security and management. Companies that use LBS have seen performance enhancements of 16% in service revenues and 15% in customer retention, on average. 83% of best-in-class companies currently leverage location-based services but supercharge the returns by adopting a comprehensive service chain strategy around their technology deployment.This strategy encompasses the 4 key pillars of, i) process; ii)organizational support; iii)knowledge management; and iv) performance measurement; and thereby serves to enhance LBS returns to both customer-facing and internal operational/financial metrics. As such, best-in-class firms complete almost a full work order more per service technician per day when compared to all other firms, which leads to a 230 basis point advantage in service margins.

General prospects or bundling energy with energy management, building management services and facilities management are lower than most energy suppliers expect.

This new series of market studies measures current market sizes, and estimates and forecasts demand for substation automation and integration equipment. In addition to profiling utility requirements and plans, the research program is focused on defining the broader product and market requirements which suppliers must meet in order to successfully participate in the substation automation and integration programs within electric utilities worldwide. This new round of research provides an appraisal of products, instruments and related substation equipment that electric utilities of all sizes will be specifying, recommending and purchasing during the forecast period. All volumes are available as of January 2006.

The Report includes the results of a comprehensive research effort under the leadership of renowned industry analyst Warren Causey. The Report includes an industry overview and analysis, utility management survey and interview results, an analysis of the vendor landscape, and vendor profiles.