Energy transaction platform Kraken is venturing beyond administering energy accounts, reaching today into other utilities such as telecoms, water & broadband.
Described as ‘cloud-native’, Kraken does the nuts-and-bolts monitoring and billing for a contracted total of 25 million accounts in six nations worldwide.
As such, it aims to replicate the shovel-sellers who famously profited more than gold prospectors during California’s mid-nineteenth century Gold Rush.
For owner Octopus as well for its UK rivals, Kraken claims to track transaction events covering 40% of the nation’s power consumers.
It claims around 20 successful migrations for Octopus and for its competitors EDF, E.On, Good Energy, Australian supplier Origin and Tokyo Gas.
Silicon Valet keeps the code tidy
Fifty new jobs are being added to the existing 250 IT analysts and code-writers employed by the enterprise. Kraken’s team will work across Octopus Energy Group’s tech hubs in London, Manchester, Houston, Silicon Valley, Sydney and Tokyo.
Joining from Boston Consulting Group, though partnering Octopus as an associate since 2018, Deepak Ravindran will head Kraken Utilities, as the enlarged business unit is now known.
Resident entirely in computing’s cloud environments and nowhere else, Kraken delivers a claimed 100 releases each day, supported by vast quantities of automated testing. The set-up allows secure process development at speeds vastly greater than traditional platforms, thereby enhancing system resilience and service levels.
Fast-changing technology presents, in Octopus’ view, huge opportunities offered to secure operating efficiencies from big data and machine learning.
CEO Ravindran commented: “Kraken is well on its way to revolutionising the energy sector. It has brought a new level of customer centricity and now powers the most loved energy utilities globally.
“This is an incredibly exciting time for me, and the whole team here, to help bring this transformation to great companies across the globe.”
Octopus Energy founder Greg Jackson – pictured with Ravindran – explained:
“We’ve increasingly been approached by water companies, telcos and other utilities who saw the way that Kraken has transformed customer and employee experience in energy, whilst driving down costs and opening up whole new opportunities through technology and customer engagement.
Jackson elaborated: “With forward-thinking utilities and regulators seeking to benefit from lower operating costs, better customer experience and exploiting whole new efficiencies through machine learning and big data, we’ve been working hard to expand Kraken from its revolutionary position in energy to offer these advantages across all utilities.”
