Gentrack announces Broadband Billing and CRM platform for energy utilities

26 May 2010: New Zealand based software development company Gentrack, announced today its latest broadband billing and CRM capabilities to support New Zealand’s Ultra-fast Broadband Investment Initiative.

Gentrack software is used by many of New Zealand’s electricity lines companies and energy retailers, providing key opportunities for these companies to leverage their existing Gentrack platforms to bill and manage products and services delivered to the home via the new ultra-fast broadband network. 

The Government’s proposed market changes are expected to create a more competitive, high performing and low cost fibre market, changes many New Zealand households have long waited for says Terry Maude, Chief Technology Officer at Gentrack.

“We are anticipating that many of our utility customers will jump at the opportunity to deliver lit and unlit fibre given it’s a logical extension to electricity, gas and water products and services. We have set out to ensure that the Gentrack billing and CRM platform not only continues to support their network and retail activities – but that it also provides the flexibility to bill fibre network access and products as well as streamlining B2B market switching activities.”

Gentrack’s flagship utility billing product is used in over 40 utility companies worldwide including a number of lines companies involved in the New Zealand Regional Fibre Group vying for a share of the Government’s $1.5 Billion broadband fund – Vector, Northpower and Unison.

“We see fibre as another utility product much like electricity and gas” says Maude. “It may have a fixed charge component for network access, and dependant on the services delivered, it may have some level of usage data with variable charges that needs be to tracked and billed. Lines companies, for example, may choose to bill households directly for products or they may choose to bill providers of services such as pay TV and high speed internet that require access to the fibre network.”

In conjunction with Gentrack’s billing engine, the software also boasts innovative workflow management and CRM tools to enable utility companies to streamline fibre service management activities such as B2B market switching and to engage with customers as new fibre products become available.  Gentrack’s flexible customer payment arrangement facilities and revenue collection tools will also be essential for managing fibre services.

“Having spent over 20 years working with utilities,” concludes Maude, “we understand the importance of data management and market interactions, and how critical it is to run an accurate billing engine – especially when dealing with a myriad of products, services, tariffs and complex data streams. Gentrack Velocity can be deployed relatively quickly to any utility looking to bill access to or products over a fibre network. Our R&D plan will see continued development of our software to ensure full advantage can be taken of the fibre opportunities presented by this government initiative.”

Click here for more information on Gentrack’s broadband billing and CRM solutions.