Cooper Power Systems, a division of Cooper Industries, Ltd. (NYSE: CBE) announced today that it has entered into an agreement with AT&T, to jointly market and sell to utility companies smart grid sensor devices that are certified on AT&T's wireless data network. Utilities can now receive real-time system performance data to efficiently operate their electrical grids, reduce the need for on-site inspections, and identify and solve problems that could cause outages or increase system energy losses.
"Our nation's utilities are under intense pressure to provide the latest technologies to their customers in a cost effective way," stated Cooper Power Systems group president, Mike Stoessl. "This agreement brings together Cooper Power Systems and AT&T, each of which is committed to leading the advancement of smart grid technology. Working together we will be able to help utilities streamline the way in which they gather the critical information they need to better serve their customers."
"AT&T continues to focus its efforts in building out a robust set of smart grid capabilities for the global utility industry. By offering Cooper Power Systems' smart grid sensors, we can now provide businesses the ability to monitor their distribution network in real-time," said Chris Hill, vice president, mobility product management, AT&T Business Solutions. "AT&T's suite of M2M (Machine-to-machine) pricing plans designed specifically for the advanced meter infrastructure (AMI) market, nationwide coverage, and dedicated M2M platform makes these wireless grid monitoring solutions an economical, secure, and rapidly deployable choice for utilities."
Cooper Power Systems will co-sell two products with AT&T under this agreement: OutageAdvisor™ and VARAdvisor™. OutageAdvisor™ transmits the location and other detailed information about fault conditions in real-time over AT&T's wireless network. This solution increases grid reliability and reduces the need for the costly and time-consuming methods used in the past to identify and fix distribution grid problems. VARAdvisor™ also helps utility customers save time and money while improving the overall energy efficiency of the grid. VARAdvisor™ monitors the status of fuses on distribution capacitor banks and notifies the utility of a fuse failure so they can quickly identify the reason behind the failure, replace the fuse and get the capacitor bank back online. These smart sensor solutions from Cooper Power Systems improve system reliability, increase utility productivity and reduce energy losses
