SINGAPORE’s FIRST E-COMMERCE MARKETPLACE FOR ENERGY POWER UP

The choice to power businesses with clean energy is just a few clicks away with the launch of Singapore’s first e-commerce site for energy, Electrify.sg.

The laser show at Marina Bay Sands Singapore lights up the sky. Businesses and Singapore residents alike will be able to choose their energy provider come the second half of 2018.

Southeast Asia’s first e-commerce platform for electricity has launched, making it easier for businesses in Singapore to choose renewable energy to power their operations.

Electrify.sg was set up by two former Sunseap executives and officially launched on July 12. 

Based on a consumer’s power consumption habits gleaned from the site’s search filters, Electrify.sg uses a pricing engine to list a range of packages from third-party energy retailers. 

Users can then compare prices and offers, before deciding on the most suitable option. They can also access alternative energy options such as clean energy and carbon offsets. 

Singapore began liberalising its energy market in 2001, when commercial and industrial consumers who use more than 2,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per month became eligible for ‘contestability’, the ability to choose who to buy electricity from. By the second half of 2018, the industry will be fully liberalised with 1.3 million Singapore households able to pick their energy provider, which is known as full retail contestability. 

Contestable consumers currently have three options to buy power: through customised plans with energy retailers, at the variable wholesale market price for energy, or return to the default SP Services tariff rate if their monthly consumption exceeds 4,000 kilowatt hours. 

The options that will become available to domestic consumers next year have not yet been announced. 

Before Electrify.sg, companies that wanted to buy from energy retailers besides the default provider, SP Services, had to run extensive online searches and make telephone calls for quotes to assess their options, said Martin Lim, co-founder and chief operations officer at Electrify.sg at a press conference last week. The terms for what each retailer offers are not usually standardised, meaning that customers would find it difficult to make like-for-like comparisons.

By contrast, founders of the start-up say it only takes four steps to search, compare and purchase a new power plan on Electrify.sg.

Sustainable energy is not just a tree-hugging, feel-good thing. It’s a very practical business process.

Martin Lim, co-founder and chief operations officer, Electrify.sg

Lim said businesses can save about 20 per cent of their electricity bills by switching to energy retailers, compared to the SP Services tariff price. Electrify.sg is free for consumers to use, but takes a percentage of the transaction fee for each deal closed.

Beyond what it currently offers, Electrify.sg will this quarter launch PowerQuotes, a function to allow large energy companies to launch a tender quickly, and is looking into offering bundled deals with transport and telecommunications providers.

The two founders also have a long term ambition to take their business to Vietnam, Thailand and Philippines - countries that are opening up their energy markets - as well as big energy markets such as Australia and the United Kingdom, in the coming years. 

SOURCE: www.eco-business.com