Digitalization is hitting the energy industry by empowering energy producers and retailers, butmore importantly it’s empowering the end customers and the energy producers and retailers areno longer in possession of all power. Due to digitalization, energy networks are beingmodernized and new emerging technologies called smart grids and smart meters have beenintroduced. Smart grids can automatically monitor energy flows and adjust to changes in energysupply and demand. Smart meters on the other hand empowers the consumers to adapt theirenergy usage in both time and volume to different energy prices throughout the day by costcuttingtheir energy.With empowered and conscious end-customers, electricity retailers will have to compete in newways or risk losing their business. There is a risk that the majority of the over 100 electricityretailers in Sweden will be wiped out with time if data and information is not leveraged to theend-customers. This is potentially also threatening the business of TSU as well as othercompanies providing IT solutions to the energy market.For long Tieto Smart Utility (TSU) has offered IT services for both electricity retailers anddistributors across the Nordics. In relation to recently developed solutions as well as theopportunities and challenges created by digitalization and disruptive technologies such as smartmeters, the Nordic countries are in the forefront. Hence, TSU sees a potential in increasing itspresence in Western Europe to provide services to the retailers and distributors. However, inorder to expand to Western European countries TSU seeks to have a greater marketunderstanding of the different markets, in terms of for example market size, market structure,regulations. The problem is to have a structured and comprehensive way to increase marketunderstanding when assessing new West European energy markets due to the major differencesin each country.This thesis therefore aims to develop a framework which enables IT solution providers toconduct a market opportunity analysis in order to increase market awareness and assess theopportunities and potential in Western European markets, influenced by the smart-meter roll outand thus facilitate strategic decisions.A framework has been developed on the foundation on existing frameworks and applied onTSU by conducting a case study on a market opportunity assessment tool for energy IT solutionproviders. The framework consists of three levels of analysis; European-, Country- andCustomer Level which intends to identify market opportunities and potential.This thesis provides a framework for companies who wants to assess market opportunities andfacilitates strategic decisions regarding the potential of entering the markets. The findings of thisthesis has shown that the market opportunities for TSU are the greatest in Germany especiallydue to the market magnitude as well as the status for the smart meter roll-out. Furthermore,since IT solution providers usually offers many different services and solutions, the findings canbe used in a larger extent in order to asses the potential depending on type service and solution.

It is known that the heating and cooling market constitutes a large part of energy market across Europe and that the domestic and non-domestic buildings have together the largest share of energy demand. The aim of the European climate goals is to reduce the use of fossil fuel based systems and the allowance of energy demand. These have been striving reasons to increase efficiency and reduce GHG emissions on energy systems for buildings. The climate goals and regulations mentioned in this study implicates that European countries strives towards renewable sources in the heating sector, and encouraging heating networks with renewable sources. E.ON has developed a new low temperature district heating and cooling system called EctogridTM, a heat network integrated with heat pumps and cooling machines to supply energy. This thesis will thoroughly describe this heating and cooling system, called EctogridTM, and its constitutive components. The aim of this study is to determine whether the energy markets in Germany and United Kingdom are ready for an introduction of EctogridTM, and exploit existing and upcoming obstacles. To determine this, two research questions are answered through literature review, research and a case analysis. The first research question is evaluating the energy market in Europe with a focus on the heating demand in Germany and United Kingdom where fossil fuels are the dominating fuel. Second research question is comparing EctogridTM with a 4th generation district  heating  network, 4GDHn, in costs to evaluate the competitiveness with existing energy systems on the market. It is concluded that obstacles exist, how big they are for EctogridTM differs from country to country. How developed and flexible the infrastructure is, what energy sources and technologies are commonly used for heating purposes, building insulation, energy prices and regulations are factors that more or less variates from country to country and decides the severity of the feasible imposed obstacles. Germany and United Kingdom mostly uses decentralized gas boilers for the building heating demand, people often reasons them to have cheap running cost due to the energy prices. This study shows that that despite the big difference in energy price between gas and electricity for a household, heat pumps with a minimum COP of 3.5 will have lower running costs  than traditional gas boilers. Since EctogridTM uses heat pumps with a COP between 4-5, in optimal conditions, it is quite competitive in running cost to gas boilers. The obstacle here lies in most buildings being old and insufficient insulated for an EctogridTM system and the investment costs often being more expensive compared to gas boilers. Installing a heat pump or a gas boiler shows that the CO2 emissions per kWh of useful heat (kg CO2/kWh) are 0.31 for a gas boiler and 0.16 for an AHP which means a decrease in emissions of around 50% per useful kWh heat. The case study compared 4GDHn with an EctogridTM solution as an energy system. The case study consisted of 3 buildings with a heating and cooling need in a newly built area in Germany and United Kingdom. The study showed that an EctogridTM solution was more expensive for the customers but more profitable for producers when comparisons were made with regards to the current energy prices and estimations. However, a larger area with a much higher energy demand needs to be considered to see the real competitiveness of EctogridTM and electrified solution. A larger cooling demand will benefit EctogridTM  while reducing the profits of a 4GDHn. The uncertainty of the acquired data, since no pilot project exists yet, makes it hard to draw a certain conclusion whether it is a more competitive energy system than a 4GDHn and other current low carbon heating systems. / Värme- och kylbehovet utgör en stor del av energisektorn i Europa, där kommersiella och icke- kommersiella byggnaderna tillsammans står för den största andelen av energibehovet i energimarknaden. Målet med Europas klimatmål är bland annat att minska användningen av fossila bränslen samt energibehovet. Klimatpåverkan från värme- och kylsystem i byggnadssektorn har varit omfattande och klimatmålen motiverar ägarna av energisystemen att bli mer energi effektiva och minska deras växthusemissioner. Klimatmål och bestämmelser som nämns i denna rapport visar att länderna i Europa strävar efter att främja förnybara källor i värmesektorn, där värmenätverk är ofta nämnd.E.ON har utvecklat ett låg temperaturs nätverk som kallas för EctogridTM, där nätverket är integrerat med värmepumpar och kylmaskiner för att leverera energi. Det här arbetet kommer noggrant att beskriva EctogridTM och dess djupgående komponenter.Syftet med denna studie är att avgöra om energimarknaden i Tyskland och Storbritannien är redo för en implementering av EctogridTM, och upplysa om de existerande samt framtida hindren. För att svara på detta är två nyckelfrågor framtagna och besvarade genom litteraturstudie, forskning och en fallstudie.Första nyckelfrågan utvärderar energimarknaden i Europa med fokus i Tyskland och Storbritanniens värmebehov där användingen av fossila bränslen utgör större delen av marknaden. Andra nyckelfrågan jämför kostnaderna mellan EctogridTM  och 4:e generationens fjärrvärmenätverk, detta för att ta veta hur konkurrenskraftig EctogridTM är gentemot nuvarande och snarliknande energisystem i marknaden. Studien visar att hinder existerar när EctogridTM introduceras till marknaden, hur stora dom är kan variera mellan olika länder. Hur utvecklat och flexibelt infrastrukturen är, vilken energikälla samt teknologi som vanligtvis används för komfortvärmen, byggnadsisolering, energipriser och bestämmelser är faktorer som mer eller mindre varierar mellan länderna och  bestämmer storheten på hindret/n. Tyskland och Storbritannien använder mestadels lokala gaspannor för värmebehovet i byggnader. Ofta associeras gaspannor med låga driftkostnader på grund av energipriserna. Den här studien visar att värmepumpar med en genomsnittlig COP som är minst 3.5 har lägre driftkostnader än traditionella gas pannor, trots den stora skillnaden mellan gas- och elpriset. Då EctogridTM använder värmepumpar som i drift skall ha en genomsnittlig COP på mellan 4-5, vid optimala förhållanden, är detta system konkurrenskraftigt gentemot lokala gaspannor. Hindret här ligger i att de flesta byggnader inte är tillräckligt bra isolerade och kan implementera EctogridTM då systemet opererar i för låga temperaturer, samt att investeringskostnaderna oftast är betydligt dyrare än ett system med gaspanna. Vid installation av en luftvärmepump eller gaspanna visar att CO2 emissionerna per kWh nyttig värme (kg CO2/kWh) är 0.31 för en gaspanna och 0.16 för luftvärmepumpen, vilket leder till en halvering av CO2 utsläpp. Den skapade fallstudien jämför 4:e generationens fjärrvärmenät med en EctogridTM lösning, där systemen ska förse tre nybyggda fastigheters värme- och kylbehov i ett nybyggnationsområde i Tyskland samt Storbritannien. Fallstudien visade att implementerandet av EctogridTM var dyrare för kunden men avkastningen för energibolagen var högre än 4:e generationens fjärrvärmenät, detta baserades på nuvarande energipriser samt prissättningen. Men det är rekommenderat att göra en jämförelse över ett större område med högre energibehov än i denna fallstudie för att få en mer verklig uppfattning. Ökad andel av kylbehov än i denna fallstudie är även något att se över då det ökar avkastningen för EctogridTM och förväntas öka effektiviteten avsevärt för systemet. Något som inte är lika fördelaktigt för 4:e generationens fjärrvärmenät. Det är svårt att ge helt tillförlitliga slutsatser och resultat då ett pilotprojekt på EctogridTM inte existerar ännu, det vill säga den data som har varit grunden för vår analys och resultat är inte bekräftad att vara helt korrekta. Vilket gör att man med säkerhet inte kan säga om EctogridTM är mer eller mindre konkurrenskraftig än 4:e generationens fjärrvärmesystem och andra befintliga lågemitterande värmesystem.

In the European Union (EU), increasing final energy efficiency, so as to save energy, has become mandatory. This obligation will fundamentally alter the EU energy sector. The relevant EU directive, 2006/32/EG, requires that adjustments be made to energy billing and, where technically feasible, that new metering technologies (i.e. smart metering) be introduced. Individual EU countries are implementing these requirements in different ways: Smart metering is either being nearly fully implemented (e.g. in Italy), is being planned (e.g. in Germany), or completely disregarded (e.g. in the Czech Republic). Since the introduction of smart metering affects virtually all value-added steps, organisational structures and areas of operation in medium-sized energy providers, these providers must take the relevant requirements into account at as early a stage as possible. The present thesis analyses the effects of the introduction of smart metering on the business management of such companies. A deductive method was chosen and the effects of intro- ducing smart metering were assessed through a cross-sectional study of two separate data collections. Experts were interviewed and their statements were qualitatively evaluated. A written survey followed via online questionnaires, the results of which were quantitatively evaluated. Institutional, functional and activity-based perspectives were considered as well as normative, strategic and operative aspects of business management. The evaluation of the survey enabled a better assessment and analysis of the introduction of smart metering. An analysis of the scope of the upcoming alterations within energy providers illustrates just how fundamental a change this will bring to medium-sized energy providers. However, the outcome of the written survey shows that most executives do not recognise this need for change and therefore are unable to initiate it. These management deficiencies threaten the very existence of these companies and must be resolved through the timely initiation of consistent change management.