Energie Wasser Bern selects Previse Systems’ ETRM platform
Energie Wasser Bern (“ewb”), the city utility of the Swiss capital Bern, has chosen the Previse Coral ETRM platform to support its ambitions in the field of energy trading!
Faced by the profound change the energy sector has been undergoing for years, ewb recognised the central role played by technology in exploiting opportunities and managing risks. When embarking on the process to select a new core ETRM solution, the main aim was to put a tool in place that would allow to flexibly adapt to constantly changing market conditions and related requirements arising from the business. High standards of performance, IT security and user-friendliness were expected to be met, and equally easy integration into the existing energy trading system landscape.
As a result of a thorough evaluation, ewb established that Previse Coral performed significantly better than other products with regards to functional and technical system criteria, as well as capabilities of adaptation to current requirements as well as co-development in areas important to ewb. Also, the software was convincing in terms of user-friendliness.
Previse Coral will be deployed at ewb to comprehensively manage trading operations in electricity, natural gas, renewables and CO2 emissions. The scope of the implementation includes contributions by Previse Systems’ partners: e·Flow, the nomination and scheduling tool e·Opt Solutions, multiple interfaces delivered by Lead Consult and an automatic balancing App from Sparkspire.
”With Previse Coral, we see great potential to improve our processes in energy trading and portfolio management”, said Marc Maurer, application manager at ewb. “We are convinced that it is the modern software architecture and openness of the platform will greatly contribute to making our system landscape future-proof .”
“At Previse Systems, we are very excited about having been chosen by Energie Wasser Bern”, Marc Zumstein, head of sales at Previse Systems, said.
“It underlines the advantages our technology offers in today’s energy trading – adaptability and performance, together with easy connectivity and a high degree of intuitive usability. We are equally thrilled about welcoming our first customer in Switzerland, our “home” jurisdiction.
We look forward to the collaboration and a successful long-term partnership to support the continuing success of ewb!”
About Energie Wasser Bern
Energie Wasser Bern is the electricity, water, natural gas, waste recycling and heat supply company of the city of Bern in Switzerland. The activities of ewb mainly include the areas of electricity supply, water supply, natural gas supply, district heating supply, offers in the field of mobility (driving with natural gas and electromobility), the construction of the Bern fiber optic network and waste recycling.
As an electricity supplier, ewb supplies 70’000 private households in the city of Bern as well as 8’000 small and medium-sized companies and 100 large customers in the area of Bern with a total of about 1’000 GWh of electricity per year. Of a total of about 1’500 GWh of electricity generation from own assets and attributed from co-owned assets, 60% originate from renewable sources.
About Previse Systems
At Previse Systems, we fundamentally reshape the way Energy Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) software is designed, implemented and operated. We offer a highly performant SaaS solution for European electricity, natural gas and certificates trading – combining modern software architecture with the latest available tools and technology.
As a conceptual innovation, we build on the notion of “community”, with an infrastructure for energy companies to leverage synergies through collaboration in the IT domain. The goal of this is simple: better software, faster and at lower cost. We create software without any legacy burden. Our data structure follows accepted market standards, which drives easy and fast data migrations, and is also a core factor of strong system performance.
With Previse Systems, energy companies are well equipped to master the challenges of a fast-evolving environment.
ane.energy selects Previse Systems’ ETRM platform
The energy trading company ane.energy, based in northern Germany, has chosen the Previse Coral ETRM platform as the core application to support trading activities and ensure robust infrastructure scalability for future growth.
ane.energy – the only direct marketer of German wind power entirely owned by electricity producers – is renowned for its out-of-the-box thinking, innovative product ideas and high affinity for efficient digitalisation.
Previse Coral will be initially deployed to comprehensively manage ane.energy’s portfolio of long-term power purchase agreement (PPAs). In a next step, the plan is also to migrate short-term power trading as well as the guarantees of origin (GoO) portfolio into the system.
ane.energy sees the open App Framework / SDK as an important differentiator that will facilitate the swift deployment of proprietary functional elements – in a first step, it is planned to adjust existing interfaces as connectors to Previse Coral in the form of Apps.
”The last two years we have seen a rapidly growing demand of our green long and mid-term PPAs, both physical and financial, in the market”, said Ralf Höper, managing director at ane.energy. “Hence, we decided to establish an ETRM system that fulfils our ambitious needs in managing the embedded risks and gain additional portfolio value from actively optimising the dynamic hedging-positions.
We are confident that the Previse Coral tech stack in combination with the flexible infrastructure is the best fundament to support our future activities.”
“I am very proud of another innovative and technology-driven company with a strong focus on renewable energy choosing Previse Systems”, Asbjørn Hansen, Managing Director at Previse Systems, said.
“The ane.energy team has an agile and dynamic mindset very similar to our own, and I am sure our partnership will help facilitate the green energy transition. Being able to accurately model renewable assets, manage GoO and PPA contracts and at the same time provide scalable solutions for high frequency trading are all key elements for ane.energy – and core competencies of our software.
We look forward to the collaboration and to becoming a supporting element for the continuing success of ane.energy!”
About ane.energy
A network for renewables – free, independent and really green – that was the founding idea of ane.energy. We have made plant operators shareholders and have integrated wind, photovoltaics and biomass from all over Germany into our portfolio. This made us the last independent direct marketer.
We have remained true to our founding idea – independent and green. We are committed to the marketability of renewable energies and think out of the box. This makes us innovative, fast and digital – without neglecting coffee together or having fun at work.
We like to cooperate: with shareholders, operators and in projects with small companies as well as with the top dogs in the industry. We keep the goal in mind: efficient, sustainable energy production and marketing.
About Previse Systems
At Previse Systems, we fundamentally reshape the way Energy Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) software is designed, implemented and operated. We offer a highly performant SaaS solution for European electricity, natural gas and certificates trading – combining modern software architecture with the latest available tools and technology.
As a conceptual innovation, we build on the notion of “community”, with an infrastructure for energy companies to leverage synergies through collaboration in the IT domain. The goal of this is simple: better software, faster and at lower cost. We create software without any legacy burden. Our data structure follows accepted market standards, which drives easy and fast data migrations, and is also a core factor of strong system performance.
With Previse Systems, energy companies are well equipped to master the challenges of a fast-evolving environment.
Taking Efficiency in Energy Trading to the Next Level – Norlys Energy Trading 🇩🇰
A Strong Validation of the Ecosystem Concept
In May 2021, Previse Systems and Fidectus have embarked on a partnership to connect Previse Coral with Fidectus’ GEN platform. The goal of course was and is to enable seamless post trade processing and full back-office automation, including electronic Confirmation (eCM) and Settlement Management (eSM).
The pilot customer, Norlys Energy Trading A/S, is very satisfied with the combined solution:
“The collaboration of Previse Systems and Fidectus and their plug-and-play integration allow us to have ETRM and eCM/eSM centralised in one solution, enabling full trade lifecycle automation in one unified workflow”, says Michelle Rønne, Head of Back Office at Norlys Energy Trading.
For Previse Systems, the collaboration with Fidectus represents a strong validation of the Ecosystem concept – the combination of best-of-breed platforms and specialised applications using modern technology and communication standards.
A Previse Systems Success Story – Norlys Energy Trading 🇩🇰
Michelle Rønne, Head of Back Office at Norlys Energy Trading, talks about how Previse Systems make her life easier
“Previse Systems rethink the way ETRM software is designed – they have built a software that actually supports today’s trading patterns” says Michelle Rønne, Head of Back Office at Norlys Energy Trading A/S.
“We have worked with other solutions in the past and those solutions are not geared to handle the number of trades we are doing today. Today’s solutions need to be designed for many small trades rather than a few big ones.
The Previse Coral solution is very data and event driven, so rather than spending human resources clicking around the system, the solution automates processes and allows us to only focus on exceptions.”
Michelle, thank you very much for taking the time to share some of your impressions and experiences with the Previse Coral software with us, and with other prospective customers of Previse Systems!
Michelle: I have already mentioned performance and automation. A further important point to note is definitely the flexibility of the solution, especially around defining workflows: we are able to configure the system around our processes instead of being limited to follow processes defined by the system. Previse Coral is incredibly generic here, it allows to fine-tune the workflows exactly as we need them, e.g. with features like the transition process and the partial locking of trades.
Can you elaborate a bit on that?
Historically my experience is that we end up spending a lot of time changing the tradebook or strategy on the trade. With the Previse partial locking we can decide exactly what back office needs to have locked for controlling and what is open for front office to change.
Does that also extend to settlement processes?
Well, Previse Coral is designed with a settle date and a clearing date which allows us to model all the special rules from the clearing houses along with the exchanges. We know when the trade can be controlled based on when it will be cleared. This allows us to automate those processes.
We all know how difficult it can be to ensure that all trades that need to be controlled and settled on a given day are handled, because of all of the special rules given by the clearing houses and exchanges. So instead of setting up a very complex filter or query (which is impossible to maintain) we can simply select by yesterday’s clearing and settle date and this gives us the definitive list of items to be processed.
Has event driven settlement automation supported you in optimizing your processes?
Yes, absolutely. Since settlement is the final process of the trade, the numbers are always affected by the data upstream and it happens that some of that data might be captured incorrectly. For example, the clearing broker could have a mistake on their side for the settlement date or a manually captured trade could be wrong. In such cases, we just correct the data on the trade and the settlement event engine triggers a re-settlement of the trade automatically – we can then just flip over to the Settlement screen after editing the trade, and the data is already updated and ready for settlement.
It’s amazing not to have to run a batch process or similar! You can just process the data much quicker than in other solutions I have worked with.
Previse Systems attends the REC Market Meeting 2022 in Amsterdam
A Modern Software Tool for Renewable Energy Trading
GoOs, PPAs and more: Previse Systems have worked intensively with leading renewable energy producers and traders to develop a solution that “ticks all the boxes” – from comprehensive data management to inventory control, valuation and risk analysis and full back end processes.
Book a Meeting / System Demo with us!
Meet with Florence Hayden and Asbjørn Hansen from Previse Systems at the REC Market Meeting 2022 in Amsterdam! Use the link below to book a meeting online.
Lorenzo Costantini joins Previse Systems as Software Developer
Previse Systems is pleased to announce our new colleague Lorenzo Costantini, who has joined us as Software Developer.
Lorenzo combines two truly unique skillsets: software development in Previse Systems’ technology stack and several years of experience in energy markets and ETRM solutions. Lorenzo will increase our overall development bandwidth with a special focus on software quality assurance.
Lorenzo – welcome to the team, great to have you on board!
What is your impression of the team and work culture at Previse Systems?
The team has always been friendly and available to me since the first day. I was offered an apartment for 6 weeks in the greater Zurich area very close to my developer colleagues to avoid having a full remote onboarding, in a time when the office was not available yet. It was very useful to me to work with them in the same room at the beginning.
Apart from this initial period, Previse Systems gives you the possibility to work remotely and for many people this could be a great help in some situations. The important thing is to deliver your work, no matter where you live or where you work. So we have also some great colleagues from all over the world and I think the most diverse set of nationalities ever seen in a company, which I thought it was very cool and it was one of the reasons which helped me to decide to join this company.
Since the first days it was clear to me that I was working with a group of people who know each other very well from previous work experiences, which have fun together and with a lot of experience in the ETRM sector and in their technical domain.
All the colleagues are passionate and driven in their work and I feel a positive and optimistic mindset to succeed in our everyday challenges and in the biggest mission to help Previse Systems grow.
What can you tell us about Previse Systems’ technology stack from a developer’s perspective?
I work mainly with Microsoft technology: Microsoft Azure and its ecosystem of services (Azure DevOps, Azure Functions, Azure Batch…), C# as language for the back-end, SQL Server as database technology. But our complete stack is vast and we are open to adopt new technologies if there is a need to. Among other technologies we use I can name Vue.js, Docker, Terraform, Power BI, Cosmos DB … I remember during my first days in the company continuouslyvto listening my colleagues mentioning new technologies every day!
I am lucky to work on a modern technology stack and we are continuously working to keep everything on the latest version. For example, at the moment we are on the way to update the whole codebase to .NET 6.
Not only the stack is modern, but we also aim to follow state of the art processes on the DevOps side. We have moved last year to CI/CD as release process and I am getting more and more used to code with the help of feature flags which is a new concept to me.
The codebase is organised via microservices which can be deployed independently, and this helps code modularity, extensibility and readability of the code. During my first time at Previse Systems I had to update some shared internal libraries and to let them be used by all the other single components of the system – it was manageable for me to read and learn one component of the codebase at a time and to gradually update all of them. With a different architecture it would have been more difficult, risky and time consuming.
What are, in your view, the core challenges of ETRM development?
Markets and general requirements are constantly evolving and in order to be able to profit from a new trading opportunity the development and the entire operations team needs to keep up with those changes. That has been the main challenge also considering my previous work experience.
I have experienced that in some cases even having a periodic 2-weeks release cycle, already short compared to other realities, is not enough for traders or other stakeholders. Platform changes may be needed in a shorter time, and that’s why Previse Systems have moved on a CI/CD process. This need for a very short time to market is the reason behind most of the DevOps and processes upgrades we have been doing during the last year.
But microservices and DevOps processes alone cannot be the only answer to this problem, because also the decisions on data models and the assumptions made on the requirements can make or break a project. Having people in the team with a lot of expertise in the commodity trading sector is a great asset to build an extensible product with a sound underlying data model, reducing the risk of having impossible or difficult redesign in the future when requirements will change.
Some clever ideas have been implemented also on a lower level: the trade templates concept, the usage of a consistent CRUD approach in many APIs coupled to high level reusable patterns, or the implementation of a consistent web page styling which makes UI flexible and configurable from database helps a lot to implement in a fast way similar new features.
Previse Systems Kicks Off ETRM Educational Mini-Series
Today the first episode of the new educational series by the Insider’s Guide to Energy was released!
Listen in to Previse Systems’ Asbjørn Bjarke Hansen talk about current trends in the energy markets and the competitive edge of the right technology in today’s energy trading environment.
- What are the main benefits of SaaS and built-for-cloud in this context?
- How can an ecosystem create value, and how is the Coral Ecosystem structured and operated?
- Why is high system performance a crucial driver in using an ETRM in today’s markets, and how does Previse Systems achieve its ambitious goals in this area?
This, and much more, in today’s first edition of the ETRM mini series! Alternatively, watch the video on Youtube (yes – that is a bottle of Grappa behind Asbjørn … 🙈).
Many thanks to our partners Fidectus and FORRS for making this happen!
Ørsted selects Previse Coral and ChorusLink for Day-Ahead and Intraday Power Trading
Zug, 9 December 2021: Previse Systems announced today that Ørsted has selected Previse Coral and ChorusLink for their day-ahead and intraday power trading operations in Denmark.
The solution will deliver full process automation: direct trade import from Nordpool, calculation of fees, settlement, fee and settlement matching against Nordpool, as well as an interface to SAP. Additionally, the solution will generate the REMIT reporting file and submit it via Equias to ACER.
Previse Systems’ partner Lead Consult will supply several elements of the overall solutions as Apps – namely the interface to Nordpool, settlement and fee matching, and the export of the REMIT file to Equias.
Asbjørn Hansen, Managing Director at Previse Systems, said:
“We are extremely excited about signing up one of the world most significant players in renewable energy and adding them to our customer portfolio. Bringing on yet another large energy trading company onto our platform just re-emphasizes the strength of our product, our team and our partners.
Working with Ørsted during the Proof-of-Concept over the past months to show the direct value of our solution has been a privilege. We are looking forward to supporting Ørsted on their journey from old on-premise legacy solutions to a fully cloud-based and automated ETRM platform designed for the future.”
About Ørsted
The Ørsted vision is a world that runs entirely on green energy. Ørsted develops, constructs, and operates offshore and onshore wind farms, solar farms, energy storage facilities, and bioenergy plants, and provides energy products to its customers. Ørsted ranks as the world’s most sustainable energy company in Corporate Knights’ 2021 index of the Global 100 most sustainable corporations in the world and is recognised on the CDP Climate Change A List as a global leader on climate action. Headquartered in Denmark, Ørsted employs 6,672 people. Ørsted’s shares are listed on Nasdaq Copenhagen (Orsted). In 2020, the group’s revenue was DKK 52.6 billion (EUR 7.1 billion).
About Previse Systems
At Previse Systems, we fundamentally reshape the way Energy Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) software is designed, implemented and operated. We offer a highly performant SaaS solution for European electricity, natural gas and certificates trading – combining modern software architecture with the latest available tools and technology.
As a conceptual innovation, we build on the notion of “community”, with an infrastructure for energy companies to leverage synergies through collaboration in the IT domain. The goal of this is simple: better software, faster and at lower cost. We create software without any legacy burden. Our data structure follows accepted market standards, which drives easy and fast data migrations, and is also a core factor of strong system performance.
With Previse Systems, energy companies are well equipped to master the challenges of a fast-evolving environment.
About Lead Consult
LEAD Consult is a dynamic, customer-oriented company, specialised in providing software solutions as well as business and IT consulting services in the energy and financial sectors. Our deep industry knowledge together with excellent skills in management consulting, technology and innovation allows us to challenge the conventional thinking and deliver exceptional results that have a lasting impact on businesses and companies worldwide.
For more information, visit https://www.leadconsult.eu/.
Florence Hayden joins Previse Systems as Product and Markets Specialist
Previse Systems is excited to announce that Florence Hayden has joined our growing team as Product and Markets Specialist.
With several years of international experience in the delivery and integration of ETRM software, Florence now fills a much wider role at Previse Systems: beyond the classical tasks of a business analyst, Florence also owns various system components from a product management perspective, and supports sales with great product demonstrations.
Florence – welcome to the team, great to have you on board!
What does a typical workday look like for Florence?
There really is no typical day working at Previse, that’s part of the fun! My role is both customer- and product-centric, so I spend a lot of time supporting our customers who are in the process of implementing Previse Coral. This means working with front office, middle office and back office, collecting feedback on what they like, what could be improved and what enhancements we can do to ensure the platform supports their business activities in the best way possible.
In parallel, I also work with the product team designing new functionality, so a fair amount of time is spent writing specifications, collaborating with our development teams and testing new features. In addition to this, I often support the sales process in delivering product demonstrations and proof-of-concepts to potential customers. So no two days are ever the same!
Who are the customers of Previse Systems? What can you tell us about them?
The customer I currently work the closest with is Norlys Energy Trading, a European Gas and Power trading house based in Denmark who this year have grown their business at an accelerated pace whilst implementing Previse Coral to support their trading activities. We have worked hard with them ensuring platform readiness for trading various products and markets across Europe with several successful go-lives already completed this year. They are a fantastic group of people to work with and it is exciting supporting them in their ambitious journey whilst simultaneously growing and developing the Coral platform’s core ETRM capabilities.
What is special about working for Previse Systems?
So many things! Number one is the people – the team at Previse are incredibly talented, innovative and driven which is demonstrated in how much the company has achieved in such a short space of time. I also love how much responsibility and ownership each individual has, your work literally has a visible impact from day one. And finally, the opportunity to work with new technologies and be part of the journey to developing a new-era ETRM solution in the fast-changing energy markets of today is pretty exciting!
Fidectus and Previse Systems Enter Strategic Partnership
Zürich, Zug, September 20th, 2021 – Fidectus and Previse Systems today announced a strategic partnership to add Fidectus’ post trade processing capabilities to Previse Systems’ Coral Ecosystem.
This strategic partnership enables EFET´s electronic Settlement Matching (eSM) and electronic Confirmation Matching (eCM) out of the box, while keeping clients’ total cost of ownership at a bare minimum.
With native connectivity between the two platforms, the client community can now take advantage of a next generation ETRM solution combined with comprehensive post trade capabilities in energy trading, enabling straight-through processing of trade confirmations, settlements, nettings, financing, and payments. Jointly the Fidectus and Previse Systems services become a seamless experience maximising clients’ ROI.
Join us to see a live demonstration on the integration of these two industry leading innovators at the ETOT 2021 conference in London, October 5-6, 2021.
“The partnership with Fidectus is a great example of how our ecosystem concept fosters collaboration among vendors of complementary products, enabling customers to compose “best-of-breed” solutions. We believe that our customers are looking for the value and flexibility provided by open architectures and a modern technology stack. For many companies, replacing aging and inefficient systems with an ecosystem-approach becomes an interesting alternative as it ensures innovation without the costs, risks and lock-in effects associated with legacy architectures and connectors,” says Asbjørn Hansen of Previse Systems.
Jens Bartenschlager of Fidectus says: “We are happy to join forces with Previse Systems into a new era of energy trading. This partnership further accelerate adoption of our next generation post-trade and cross-company services and creates additional benefits to our joint client community.”
About Fidectus
Fidectus is a Swiss-based company revolutionizing post-trade processing for the over-the-counter energy and commodity markets. Our Global Energy Network (GEN) connects market participants and enables them to significantly reduce cost, risk, and illiquid capital through intelligent tools for reporting, confirmation, settlement, netting, financing, and payment. Clients can now better manage their working capital and improve their operating profitability putting them at a competitive advantage.
For more information, visit https://fidectus.com/.
About Previse Systems
At Previse Systems, we fundamentally reshape the way Energy Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) software is designed, implemented and operated. We offer a highly performant SaaS solution for European electricity, natural gas and certificates trading – combining modern software architecture with the latest available tools and technology.
As a conceptual innovation, we build on the notion of “community”, with an infrastructure for energy companies to leverage synergies through collaboration in the IT domain. The goal of this is simple: better software, faster and at lower cost. We create software without any legacy burden. Our data structure follows accepted market standards, which drives easy and fast data migrations, and is also a core factor of strong system performance.
With Previse Systems, energy companies are well equipped to master the challenges of a fast-evolving environment.
For more information, visit https://previsesystems.com/